


Draco Malfoy and the Sleep of Fleeting Death

by Incarnation_of_Satan



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Christmas at Hogwarts, Comfort, Crossdressing, Cute, Draco Malfoy in a Skirt, Draco Malfoy is a Gift, Drarry, Fluff, Harry Potter Epilogue What Epilogue | EWE, Hogwarts Eighth Year, M/M, Parselmouth Harry Potter, Potions, Room of Requirement
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-20
Updated: 2020-12-30
Packaged: 2021-03-10 23:35:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 24
Words: 50,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28195542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Incarnation_of_Satan/pseuds/Incarnation_of_Satan
Summary: Draco Malfoy: Proud, sophisticated pureblood, wizard, and potioneer; survivor of the War, ex-death-eater, sole heir to the Malfoy legacy, and sufferer of nightmares.He's tired of the nightmares that plague him; so he begins to create a potion to stop them.This is all very simple. So how in the name of Merlin did Potter get involved?The story is mine; credit for the characters goes to JK Rowling.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 43
Kudos: 99
Collections: Drarry





	1. Draco Malfoy Knows Far Too Much About Harry Potter

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoy!

This was just a fact.

Fire is hot, Dementors feed off of happiness, Draco Malfoy has an extensive knowledge on Harry Potter.

Throughout his first seven years at Hogwarts, Draco would unload these facts on his parents, especially during the holidays. (However, if he added a new fact to his repertoire, he would definitely owl it home.) Thus, Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy had an extensive knowledge on Harry Potter. From how he liked his tea, to what he ate when in a certain mood, to spots in Hogwarts he frequented when he had nightmares, to what precise shade of green his eyes were (and the fact that they seemed to lighten and darken in certain moods. Draco had declared that no artist could fully capture their proper liveliness and brightness; so, of course, Draco had had to give it a shot. He'd taken up art sometime in fourth year, after the success of the "Potter Stinks" badges. He'd picked it up surprisingly fast; he dropped it, though, when he decided that even _he_ couldn't portray Potter's eyes quite right. (He'd picked it up again during sixth year, though, as a sort of coping mechanism. His skills improved drastically.) What had been entertaining for his friends to watch during this time was that Draco had often antagonised Potter just to see a certain shade of green, or to see how the light hit his eyes at specific moments; to how he talked, to his tells when he was lying to how far he went when you insulted his family (Draco knew that one from personal experience; it'd been one of the first owls he'd sent home containing a Potter Fact in first year).

His parents, however, were a candle flame next to a bonfire compared to his closest friends in terms of knowledge about Harry Potter. They'd had to listen to the smallest of facts that Draco picked up on every day for the whole seven years. But oh, Draco wasn't done. They still had eighth year to go, after all.

"He had a nightmare last night," Draco murmured to Pansy at breakfast one Friday morning.

"What, stalking him again?"

Draco looked scandalised. "Of course not! Just look at him. He's eating french toast, and he's got extra maple syrup on top- must've been a bad nightmare- with only a couple of strawberries. And he's got a cup of coffee, too, to wake him up. If he's got syrup on his toast, it must be three sugars in the coffee, and probably a full shot of espresso."

"And?"

"Alright, maybe I saw him out by the Black Lake last night skipping stones-"

"You _were_ stalking him!"

"Was _not_!"

"What were you doing, then?"

"I was going to get potions ingredients, as a matter of fact."

"Oh, _were_ you now."

"I _was_!-"

"Alright, you two," Blaise interrupted. "It's just Potter."

Under his breath, Draco muttered, "Just Potter, just Saint bloody _Potter_ with his scar and his-"

"Draco!"

Draco rolled his eyes. "Alright, alright. So, yeah, Potter had a nightmare. Doesn't make him special, though," Draco added. "I had a nightmare too."

"So did nearly everyone who had such a big role during the war. I'd be more surprised if you slept peacefully." Draco froze like a deer in headlights. His body stiffened up, eyes wide, and he stopped moving entirely. "Oh, Merlin. Draco. What did you do?"

"Nothing! Absolutely nothing! I slept terribly last night, did I say?" He started moving very exaggeratedly, and speaking loudly and with more bravo. "Up all night collecting ingredients for- but that's not important!" He waved his hand as though to wave away what he'd just said. Pansy and Blaise exchanged a look.

For as long as they could remember, Draco had always tried to hide secrets and cover up lies through distractions; whether it be distracting tales or physical motions, he'd try to draw your attention away from what he was trying to hide. "I was out in the forest and then down in the old potio- I mean-"

"Darling, you can't hide things. Spit it out."

"Well..." He paused, then deflated, his body sagging, looking almost ashamed. "You said it yourself," he said, far quieter. "Everyone who had a big role in the war has nightmares now. I- I hate them- the nightmares, I mean- and I'm pretty sure everyone else does, too. Potter was talking about his nightmares earlier. You can tell 'cause he looks over his shoulder like he's looking for the Dark- for Voldemort. And he tenses up, and he just looks annoyed. He's definitely tired of the nightmares, now the war is over and all. We're all supposed to be happy and smiling and perfectly normal now, but we can't be normal when we're all being plagued every night by reminders of the past. I'm tired of it, but Dreamless Sleep is addictive, and therefore dangerous to use.

"So, um, I was trying to make a - a potion that can fix that. I got permission from McGonagall, and I'm using Snape's old classroom and his ingredients. I'm just experimenting, but..."

"Oh, Draco," Pansy said, her voice a little softer than usual.

Blaise leaned over and patted Draco on the shoulder. "That's good of you, Draco."

"Yeah, we're- well done, Draco. Well done."

That night, Draco snuck down to the potions rooms again.

He set up all the usual wards, letting people in but alerting him and identifying them, and protective wards around the ingredients and the cauldrons and the possible danger zone and himself.

Finally, he set up the small muggle radio in the corner; it'd been here when he'd started making the potions, and McGonagall told him she'd put it there in case he wanted music to work to. She showed him how to make it work manually- but that'd been months ago. Now Draco just cast a few spells at it and it sprung to life, blaring the newest popular muggle music. Draco had been listening to this specific station for so long, he actually sort of knew a few of the songs. As he grabbed a scalpel to start cutting up ingredients, he sang along quietly to them, making sure his silencing charms were up and working. As he poured the first tray of ingredients into the cauldron, bubbling with water (mixed with three drops of Essence of Dittany), he felt something brush against his arm. He shrugged it off as the breeze- the window was open- and shut the window quickly. He didn't want anything as unreliable as a breeze to potentially mess up his potions.

When he was on the last step- 'stir clockwise slowly seven times, and then wave your wand to complete the potion. It should take on a shimmery violet tint'- he decided to add a few Lacewing Flies, because why not? He knew Lacewing Flies were usually used in Polyjuice potions, but other items in the Sleeping draught caused things like poisoning, inflammation, and death, but instead just sent the imbiber to sleep. An ingredient of Polyjuice potion couldn't do much harm, right?

Not really thinking, he didn't step back as the potion started bubbling more violently. When he looked down, it was a navy blue, and matte as Luna's latest nail polish, although still bubbling. He barely had time to recall that Lacewing Flies were highly reactive when paired with ground-up Dragon's Heartstring and duck before the potion- a rather acidic sludge of near-black goop- exploded. It hit the walls of his containment charms but went no further, thankfully. A quick "Scourgify!" and it was gone.

He sighed, resigning himself to making another derivative of the Dreamless Sleep Potion when he remembered the train of thought he'd had earlier.

_Other items in the potion caused things like poisoning, inflammation, and death, but instead just sent the imbiber to sleep._

Caused things like death.

You can't counter something like that, can you?

But the potion didn't cause any pain or casualty- just sent the drinker to sleep.

_Sleep_!

That was _it_!

He jumped up, Accioed his notebook and a nearby quill and ink he hadn't seen lying about (or he would've cleaned it up; it's not very responsible to leave liquids in the same space as a potentially volatile substance, especially when they could mix and make something truly nasty) and scribbled down his train of thought.

**DEATH FROM POWDERED ROOT OF ASPHODEL + INFUSION OF WORMWOOD + VALERIAN SPRIGS WEAKENED BY SOMETHING TO MAKE IT NOT PERMANENT**

**SOMETHING COUNTERS THE PAIN?**

**SOMETHING COUNTERS THE DEATH IN ITSELF?**

**TURNS IT INTO SLEEP INSTEAD**

And then, so his future self or any other potions masters who may read this in the future to parade his brilliant work didn't get confused, Draco wrote, very slowly,

**DREAMLESS SLEEP IS BASICALLY FLEETING DEATH**

With this revelation, he continued with his theory; mainly, going through and listing the ingredients and what they did, and how they were counteracted by other ingredients, or how they combined or reacted with others.

Finally, he reached the very last one.

_1 ML UNICORN BLOOD_

Just the very slightest bit; what did it even do? What did _unicorn blood_ do? Draco wasn't good with animals. He frowned. Looked around. When his eyes landed on a wriggling vial of- something, a thought came to mind.

He returned to the classroom a few minutes later, tentatively stroking the spine of the Monster Book of Monsters Hagrid had had them buy for his year of teaching Care of Magical creatures. When the beast seemed to have calmed a little, Draco flicked through its pages carefully until he found the passage he was looking for.

_"Unicorn blood can be drunk in order to keep a person alive. However, the act of slaying a unicorn will cause the drinker to suffer a cursed life."_

That seemed right. But how did it-

_OH_!

Oh, oh oh, oh, _oh_!

He grinned. _Unicorn blood can be drunk in order to keep a person alive._ It counteracted the combination of the Powdered Root of Asphodel combined with the Infusion of Wormwood and Valerian Sprigs- but, as Draco looked back up the list, there was no ingredient that would make the potion addictive as it was. Unless...

_"the act of slaying a unicorn will cause the drinker to suffer a cursed life."_

Perhaps...

What if instead of causing the drinker of the blood to live half a life, it cursed them in another way? It made them addicted to the potion?

That would mean that the drinker would eventually build up a tolerance, and either have to deal with the nightmares, or use a far stronger form of sleeping potion. The stronger ones were all also ridiculously addictive, so the user would basically become an addict... All because of one ml of unicorn's blood?

Wow.

He decided to test it out. After all, that's what all good potioneers did.

He took two clippings of Mandrake root, still alive and potted. To one of them, he added a few drops from one of his many batches of textbook-perfect Sleeping draughts; the other could wait a little.

He grabbed a second pre-made potion- this one at the stage before the addition of unicorn's blood. He skipped the unicorn blood and completed the rest of the steps quickly. Surely it couldn't be that simple to make a non-addictive Sleeping draught? But then, why hadn't someone else made one? Didn't everyone get nightmares? Perhaps just not enough to try and alter an entire potion.

He added the potion without the unicorn's blood to the second mandrake clipping, stepping back just in case- you never knew what could happen with potions. He'd learned this lesson many times over from potions gone wrong. When nothing happened, he stepped closer. The first Mandrake root was dead still, flopped over as much as it could; asleep. It'd wake up in a bit, he'd only added a few drops. The second looked a little... Well, it seemed rather lifeless compared to the first clipping. But who knew? Maybe it was just really deeply asleep. Since he was waiting, he decided to go get some more Mandrake clippings from the Herbology sheds (you could never have too many). He'd gotten all his other ingredients from the Forbidden Forest, but Mandrakes didn't grow there. They made excellent test subjects; a little rough, and liable to react badly with some potions ingredients, but as long as you were careful you were fine. They all had the same reactions to poison and fatalistic things and- importantly- sleeping potions as humans did, which was Draco's favourite thing about them. Plus, being only clippings of the full plant, they didn't scream or anything terrible like that. They were quiet, waiting to be tested. And if you did accidentally kill one- well, you could powder it or dice it and reuse it in a potion!

He grabbed his notebook and quill before he left the room, planning out everything he was going to do the next day, once the Mandrake roots had had plenty of time to react and wake up.

He stepped out into the cold air; it was dark tonight.

Cloudy, too; the moon's light was diluted and the stars were invisible. Perhaps he'd go to bed afterwards, instead of returning to the potions room. He could leave the wards up, and return to work all of tomorrow; he'd done all of his homework but his Transfiguration essay, and he'd half-arsed that already, it just needed some editing.

McGonagall was letting him do all this experimenting because she didn't like the victims of the war having nightmares so much; if he told her he thought he'd made progress, he was sure she'd go easy on him. Not that McGonagall ever went easy on anybody.

But, yes, it was a chilly night; it made Draco long for his bed, soft and warm. He collected the Mandrake snippings drowsily; didn't really remember making his way down to the potions classroom and storing all the snippings. Next thing he knew, he was crawling into bed and falling asleep, forgetful of the nightmares lurking in the darkness of the night.

He didn't notice when a few minutes later, an invisible figure hidden from his wards under a cloak, slipped out of the potions classroom, having inspected Draco's notebook where he left it after dropping off his Mandrake root clippings.

He wasn't at breakfast the next morning to see Potter looking for him, a "theoretical" question about sleeping potions and draughts of death and fatal potions on the tip of his tongue. (Although Pansy and Blaise were, and shot each other a knowing look and an eye roll.)

Draco was down in his potions room, somewhat awake and sort of functioning with a Pepperup potion (or two) and a strong cup of coffee (how the muggles came up with this stuff, he'd never understand, but it was heavenly). He rolled his sleeves up, preparing for another day of work, Harry Potter the last thing on his mind for once.


	2. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and the Stone of Healing

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The . . . indicates a change of perspective.

It was just nearing the end of lunchtime when Draco was finally coaxed away from his work by the thought of a crisp green apple and something warm to drink. He made his way through the masses of students to the Great Hall and took his usual seat, expecting Pansy and Blaise to be there already. However, when he spotted his seat through the throng of students, he saw that the seats surrounding it were empty, though food was piled high on the plates before them.

He scanned the room for Pansy's short black bob, listening for Blaise's baritone voice or either of their sassiness. He began to frown as his eyes passed over the Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw tables with no result. He almost didn't look down Gryffindor- what would Blaise and Pansy even be doing at a table of lions?- but the internal need to sit with company he could have an intelligent conversation was too strong. He just glanced over the table, and had to do a double-take when he spotted Potter's nest of black hair.

There were _two_ heads of black hair there, and they were far too close together.

One face was -flustered? The other was smirking. Smirking successfully, specifically.

Draco knew this from years of observation and seven years of friendship respectively; for the first, slightly flushed cheeks, almost indistinguishable from their usual dark shade, fidgety, fiddling hands and a tapping foot, eyes darting nervously around, pushing round glasses up their nose, and chewing on their bottom lip were all obvious tells of embarrassment. For the second, the smirk was wider than the usual sardonic one, the right side pulled up ever so slightly more, the chin was tilted up defiantly to look down the nose at the other even though they were several inches shorter.

What in Salazar's name had Pansy done to _fluster_ _Potter_?

Why did she look so triumphant?

Why was Blaise with her?

She could handle herself, and she must have known she could, walking into a den of lions to make one of them bloody flustered. And while the Weasel looked a little on-edge, the mu- Granger and Potter didn't look terribly uncomfortable in the presence of two Slytherins. Strange.

Draco seated himself, grabbing an apple and resting his chin on his hands as he continued to observe. People-watching was one of his favourite pastimes; one that was well-developed after years and years of practice.

After a few minutes of Potter getting increasingly uncomfortable and Pansy getting more and more amiable with the Gryffindors, she spotted Draco. She said her goodbyes and made her way over to Draco.

Before he could get in a comment about spending time with Gryffindors lowering her intelligence, she sat down, put on her "I'm a little worried but don't want to show a human emotion in public" face, and asked quietly, "Are you alright, Draco?"

A little startled, he replied, "Yeah, why?"

"Well, your- your apple."

"My- my apple?"

"It's red."

Draco looked down, horrified. He'd thought it tasted bitter!

He resisted the urge to spit out the chunk he was chewing, and swallowed with distaste.

Blaise was chortling beside him at Draco's reaction. "Eugh. Didn't notice. You wanna finish it?"

She looked truly surprised. "You didn't notice it wasn't green? Draco, you _never_ eat red apples."

"Yeah, you have a temperature?" Blaise asked jokingly.

"Blaise! I was just wondering- almost nothing short of Potter-"

"Hey!"

"-can make you eat a red apple. How distracted were you to pick one? And to eat half of it without noticing?" Draco could tell she was about to pick up on the fact that he'd been people-watching her. She hated when he did that; she said he knew her far too well already. So he changed the subject.

"What were you doing over at the Gryffindor table, Pans? Blaise?"

Pansy wore the Look. The Look she'd had when she'd asked Draco if he was gay.

And if he was stalking Potter.

And- nearly every time Draco talked about Potter, actually.

Draco was rather familiar with the Look; he saw it quite a lot.

"Well, this morning-" she began, but Draco didn't really want to hear now. If she was wearing the Look, she was surely going to try and embarrass him somehow; and, knowing Pansy, it was going to work. The hall had gone quieter- almost tense, Draco thought. Perfect opportunity to embarrass him, with the whole school listening. Thankfully, someone else cut in at that moment.

"About that," came a voice from behind Draco. Which was strange, because he was sat with his back to the wall, so whoever it was specifically didn't want Draco to know it was them. Unluckily for them, Draco knew their voice far, far too well for them to escape identification. And Draco suddenly understood why the hall had gone quiet. They all wanted to hear the exchange between the most prominent self-proclaimed arch-nemesi of the school. He turned around with a sigh.

"Yes, Potter? What do you want?"

"Well, I was looking for you this morning, and I couldn't find you. I need to ask you a question."

"Well? I'm waiting."

"Er, you might want me to ask it in a bit more of a- secluded place." Draco raised an eyebrow and shot Pansy a glance. She was giving him the Look again. Oh, well. Better to get this over and done with; if he didn't do this now, Potter would track him down at some point and ask him then. Better do it on Draco's terms rather than Potter's.

"Alright, Potter. Lead the way." He grabbed another apple- green this time- for the journey, and put another in his expanded potions satchel. And it was a _satchel_ , not a _handbag_ or- anything like that, no matter _what_ Pansy said. A satchel. Potter was halfway to the doors; he turned and waited for Draco.

With an exasperated, very much put-upon sigh, Draco followed.

Potter led him to the Black Lake- to the spot he went to when he had nightmares, Draco noticed. The path was slightly worn; Potter must frequent this spot a lot to have made such a prominent path, as only one person.

There was one large, flat rock that Potter sat down on. Draco would not sit on a rock. Not as a Malfoy, a pure-blooded, skilled wizard. He transfigured a leaf into a plush chair, and took a seat on that. "So, um," Potter began.

"Very eloquent, Potter. Please enlighten me as to why you have brought me out here."

"Well- er- you see..."

"I'm waiting."

"Alright! It's just..."

"Yes?"

"You might get mad." Draco raised an eyebrow. "Oh, yes, because you've _never_ made me mad before. Please, Potter, continue, I beseech you."

"Okay. So. I saw on the- actually, it'd be easier to show you." He withdrew from his back pocket a weathered piece of parchment, yellowed and wrinkled. He opened it, and ink spread out over the pages, creating a message that read,

_"Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot and Prongs proudly present to you: The Marauder's Map"._

Potter pointed his wand at the parchment and said, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." The parchment unfurled, ink spreading across it, painting a labyrinth of lines across the parchment. Draco watched it form a map of- of Hogwarts?

"But- Hogwarts is unplottable!"

"My dad never did like the rules," Potter said in response, as if that explained everything.

"What do you- what does that even mea-"

"So, Malfoy, look. A pair of footsteps represent one person. So here, this big black mass," he pointed to what was, indeed, a big black mass, with indecipherable scribbles and scrawls shown at its edges. "That's the Great Hall, with everyone in it. Up here is the teacher's table," he pointed to a rectangle, where a row of footsteps were individually labelled with names. "And we're over- here." He showed Draco two pairs of footsteps, stationary next to the water's edge. The labels read _"Harry Potter"_ and _"Draco Malfoy"._ Potter stood up and took a few steps away from the lake; his footsteps on the map moved as he did.

"Impressive. Why did you bring me out here, though? To show me a map?"

"No. Well, see, I was just- looking at the map the other night, and I saw you were down in Snape's old potions room and- well, I didn't- I just wanted to know why you were awake so late, and not in your dormitory. So I came down looking for you-"

"Hold on, Potter. You stalked me on a map- and when you saw I wasn't in bed, you came looking for me?" At least Potter had the decency to look ashamed.

"Um, yeah. So I came into the room and watched you a bit- you were brewing some kind of potion-"

"Potter," Draco said, becoming dangerously suspicious of something. If what Potter was saying was true, he might've seen Draco brewing the Dreamless Sleep potions... And no one was supposed to know about those! He was keeping them a secret so that if they did end up working, he could have someone distribute them and people would actually drink the potions and stop their nightmares instead of being so distrustful of Draco they refused to drink the draughts. If Potter knew who made the potions, when they were done, he'd go and tell everyone, and all Draco's hard work would go to waste! "When, exactly, was this? And how did you get into my room? I put wards up. And I didn't see you."

"Well, I, er, I have this invisibility cloak... I guess it protected me from the wards, too. I brushed past you at one point; you went and closed a window." Draco's eyes widened. Potter had seen him brewing the Dreamless Sleep! Oh, no, no, no, _no_ \- "I also saw this- you wrote in a notebook of some sort and you were writing about- uh- Dreamless sleep and death. And I just- I was wondering... What was that?"

Draco was shaking his head before Potter even finished his sentence. "No, Potter. Go to McGonagall if you want confirmation I'm not trying to poison anyone, but I'm not answering that question. I can't afford to let any information out at all, especially not to people who would tell their friends who would tell the rest of the school. So no, I won't answer your question. Sorry." He stood, returned his chair to a leaf, and turned to leave. "Don't go jumping to conclusions, though. Really, you can ask McGonagall. I don't have some- some nefarious plan or anything, Potter." And with that, he turned and strode away from Potter without even a glance back.

If he _had_ looked over his shoulder, he would've been able to tell that Harry was feeling rather confused, a little hurt, and ever so slightly suspicious. He did end up going to ask McGonagall, who only told him that Malfoy was to be trusted. His lingering suspicions were only eased in the slightest, and he was still incredibly confused about why Malfoy had reacted the way he had. When he retold the story to Hermione later, Ginny interrupted halfway through to let Harry know he looked like a "kicked puppy".

But Draco hadn't looked back.

He had, instead, gone straight back down to his potions room to have a look at his mandrake samplings. The one with the normal Dreamless sleep had awoken; it was writhing around again, and would be able to be reused for another test. It would be slightly altered, though; it would always want for more Dreamless sleep. Addicted to the unicorn's blood.

The second, however, which had received the potion without the unicorn blood... Well, it was still limp. Draco frowned; he'd given it plentiful time to reawaken. He decided to run a few tests to check it was still- you know, alive. Tarantallegra didn't work. Neither did Rennervate. Eventually he cast the diagnostics spell.

The mandrake was dead.

_Why_?

He scanned through his notes again, looking for anything that might have killed it. When he got to the unicorn blood, he barely resisted smacking his head against the desk. So much time wasted waiting on a dead mandrake because he'd forgotten what the unicorn blood did. It created the addiction, yes, but it also counteracted the fatal components of the potion. By taking out the unicorn blood, he'd taken out the addictive part... And also the part that prevented death. So _this_ was why there wasn't a non-addictive Dreamless Sleep potion. No one had figured out how to counteract death.

But hadn't there been something first year? A... a stone? Someone Flannel- no, Flamel... Rick? Nick? 

Nicholas Flamel! That was it!

But what was the stone?

Oh, it would take forever to search the library...

Maybe- no, he couldn't stoop that low. Preposterous! Asking for help from a- but she'd probably read every book the library held and stowed its information in her head... It would be like asking a house elf for help! They were supposed to help!

He started making his way up to Gryffindor tower.

. . .

Harry had barely finished telling Hermione his story when there was a knock on the portrait, followed by the Fat Lady's squawking. "Neville's probably forgotten the password again," Harry sighed.

"I got it," Hermione said, already moving towards the portrait.

"Neville, it's 'Bumpernuggets'. Honestly, this is the third time this week!" Harry shouted at the portrait.

Neville, however, was asleep in front of the common room fire.

Hermione opened the portrait door to Draco Malfoy holding a- a _bouquet_?

_What_?

Hermione seemed just as surprised; she was so shocked, she didn't move to stop Malfoy from grabbing her arm and pulling her outside. Harry, obviously, followed. Who knew what Malfoy could be up to now? The flowers could be poisonous!

. . .

Draco drew Granger outside with surprisingly little commotion; no one else had seen him in the portrait-hole entrance to the lion's den. Then she started struggling. "Malfoy! Let go!" He looked down and realised he was still holding her wrist, where he'd grabbed her to pull her outside. He let go like she was burning him, wiping his hand discreetly on his robes. Maybe he didn't think mud- muggleborns were as fully below him as he'd previously thought, but they were still repulsive. It was hard to make new opinions that went against all he'd ever known. He was trying, though. And then there was the fact that on top of the blood status, this was Granger! But he didn't want to offend her; he needed her knowledge.

"Right, so, have you ever heard of Nicholas Flamel?" he began. He didn't at all expect her to physically flinch away from him.

"Yes. I have. What do you want with him? And me, for that matter?"

"Well, you're a fountain of knowledge. I'm- working on a project for McGonagall. For the students who were part of the war." Granger looked incredibly suspicious and nervous and incredibly distrustful and ever so slightly curious, so Draco decided he'd have to tell her everything. "Alright. Well, you know the Dreamless Sleep potion? It's a variant of that. I- the survivors of the war all get terrible nightmares really often, right? I do, and I know Potter does, and you probably do too. But Dreamless Sleep is addictive, and too much of it can build up a tolerance, and then you have to resort to more severe drug-type potions.

"Okay. So, hear me out.

"I got McGonagall's permission to use Snape's old potion room and ingredients and cauldrons to try and make a non-addictive dreamless sleep potion for the war survivors. I think I've figured it out- the potion uses unicorn blood, and I think it's to counteract the fatal ingredients of the potion. But in the Monster Book of Monsters, it says if you drink unicorn blood, you live a cursed life. In the Potter History book, it says the Dar- Voldemort drank unicorn blood in first year in exchange for a 'Half-life'. I think in the potion, it causes the addictiveness instead of taking half of your life. 'Cause that's the biggest downside of the potion, really. But it also saves your life; Voldemort drank it to preserve himself, to survive.

"In the potion, I think it acts as a healing ingredient to combat the deadly ingredients. So, since I'm making a potion of Dreamless sleep that isn't addictive-" Draco saw the Gryffindor portrait swinging open and nobody stepping outside; he remembered Potter telling him about his invisibility cloak. Oh well. Telling Granger meant Potter would find out one way or another, anyway. "I decided to take out the unicorn blood. That obviously killed the subject-"

Granger looked horrified. "You're testing this on- on living things?!"

"Oh. Yeah, but it's just mandrake root clippings. They react nearly the same as humans would; going to sleep, being poisoned, dying." 

Granger didn't look very mollified at all, and to stop her lecturing him about mandrake root rights (Granger was infamous for her lectures) Draco hurried to distract her with other bits of knowledge and theories. "So, my Mandrake root clipping died; I figured it's cause I can't replace the unicorn blood. You need something-"

Granger, who was nodding along now, successfully distracted, finished, "Something strong to use as a healing combatant to the deadly ingredients. Right. So- how did you get to the Philo- Nicholas Flamel?" She paused. "And what's with the flowers?"

"Oh, yeah. These are Valerian sprig-"

"I thought so!" Draco raised an eyebrow. "...Sorry. Just recognised it, but wasn't sure I was right."

"Well, they're used in the Dreamless sleep potion. Closest thing to flowers I had on hand, and I wanted something to distract you so I could get you out here to talk about Flamel."

"Slytherin cunning," Granger muttered under her breath.

Draco grinned. "So, yeah. I remembered something about Flamel making some really strong healing stone, and I was wondering if you knew anything, cause it'd be far easier to ask you than to go search the library. So, d'you know anything about the stone thing?" He paused, and then turned to where he believed Potter was standing, looking at what would have been his general eye-level if he were visible. "Or you, Potter. Yes, I know you're there. You yourself told me about your invisibility cloak and map thing. I saw you come out." He frowned. "Or, rather, I didn't see _anyone_ come out. But I know you're there. Do either of you two know anything about the Flamel Stone?" Potter's head appeared, followed by the rest of his body. He looked slightly sheepish as Hermione turned to him, shocked.

"You told him about the invisibility cloak?! _And_ the map?! What else'll you use to stalk him?" Potter blushed; Draco watched on in slight amusement, slight pity as Granger continued to berate him. When she got close to revealing stuff she would, undoubtedly, later threaten Draco to forget or possibly end up obliviating from his memory, he butted in.

"So, Granger," he said, pulling her from her rant. "What do you- and you, Potter- know about Nicholas Flamel's healing stone?"


	3. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, the Philosopher's Stone, and the Elixir of Life

Potter and Granger glanced at each other. Granger looked away first; back at Draco. "Sorry, Malfoy, I can't help you there. I don't know any more than is already written in books like the Potter History book; Harry can help you, though. He knows far, far more than I do. That's all I should say here; you two should probably go somewhere more private. The reason I don't know more about the Stone is because the information is rather powerful; if it gets to the wrong person, it could be used really badly. So no, I can't help. Harry will, though."

"What? Hermione, _no_! Why would I? He won't even tell me why he wants the Phil- the Stone! And he's _Malfoy_!"

"Malfoy is right here, and he can hear you," Draco said. The two ignored him.

"It's for a really good cause, Harry. He won't tell you because- wait, why won't you tell him? You knew I'd tell him, but you told me-"

"I needed you for the information about the Stone. When I withheld from telling Potter earlier, it was because I didn't know I needed information so badly. If I _must_ ," he added with a sigh, "I suppose I can tell Potter. Come along, then. I'll tell you what I'm doing if you tell me about the Stone." He started to walk away, but paused. "Do you know anywhere more... private? I don't really know anywhere fully secluded-"

Potter sighed and started heading off in the opposite direction to the one Draco had started going towards. "Yeah, I know just the place. C'mon, Malfoy. Do you remember the Room of Requirement?"

Draco froze. "The- where Vince- and the cabinet- I mean, where you held DADA meetings the year we had Umbridge?"

Potter rubbed over a faint scar on his hand- the way rubbed at his scar he did when someone mentioned Voldemort. Remembering how he received it. "Yeah, there. Merlin, I _hate_ that old toad. In any case, we're headed to that place.

"Um- the room that the- the fiendfyre was in is still unusable, but the rest of the Room of Requirement is perfectly fine. It's the most secluded place in Hogwarts, anyway, and really the only place I could speak about this thing."

Draco nodded. "Yeah, I get it." It still stung a little to think of Crabbe; especially since that lead to his memories of the leaping fire reaching for him, and then of the look on Potter's face as he came back to get Draco; the insufferable "righteous hero" expression. Draco had never been happier to see it. He still owed Potter a life debt for that, actually. But, well, if Potter didn't bring it up, neither would he.

At this point, they'd reached the entryway to the Room. Potter stepped forwards and paced back and forth three times, muttering something under his breath. On his third passage, a door appeared in the wall. Potter stepped forwards and opened the door. "After you."

The room Potter had conjured up wasn't the worst Draco had ever been in. It was decorated with neutral colours, no specific house colours featured more than any other. Two plush purple chairs were situated around a fire- a golden, glowing fire, not the terrible scarlet of fiendfyre.

The floor was a thick mauve carpet, and the fire was the only source of light. It bathed the room in a warm yellow glow. There was a window at the far end of the room- rather small and cosy, now Draco looked around, taking everything in- that showed the sky outside to be dark, but littered with stars. The moon wasn't visible from here, but Draco had the feeling that if he saw it, it would seem bright enough to replace the sun. Sheer white drapes billowed around the window; a warm breeze drifted in.

Not terrible for a Gryffindor.

Potter had sunk into one of the chairs, his legs curled up onto the chair. He was leaning against one of the armrests, staring into the fire. Draco made his way over, and sat on the chairs as he'd been taught to- back straight, legs out in front of him, hands folded, head high. Or, well, he tried to. The chair seemed designed to make you comfortable, and Draco was embraced by the soft cushions. He felt like he was being given a warm hug. Deciding that this was _Potter_ , who had nearly killed him, and he didn't particularly care about Potter's opinion (he told the voice of Pansy that spoke up in his mind to object to _shut up_ ), he got just as comfortable as Potter looked; lounging across the chair, head on one of the armrests, legs slung over the other. He looked into the flames as he waited for Potter to say something.

It must've been a good couple of minutes that he waited before Potter spoke up. "I encountered Nicholas Flamel's invention in my first year here at Hogwarts. I'm sure you remember that the third-floor corridor was off-limits to students; well, I ended up there accidentally-" he glanced over at Draco, saw the disbelieving raised eyebrow, and added, "Shut up, Malfoy, it was an accident. I was an innocent rule-abider in first year." Draco snorted. He truly had let go of his care for his reputation in front of Potter. "I _was_! Except for- but that's beside the point. I ended up in the corridor, and I found this dog- no, never mind. Anyway, later in the year, someone got down through the third floor corridor and to what was hidden- Nicholas Flamel's stone. There were a bunch of challenges the teachers had set up you had to pass through to get to the Stone, to try and keep people out. So, I was with Hermione and Ron-"

"Obviously," Draco muttered under his breath. Potter ignored him. Wow, his self-restraint had increased drastically since first year.

"I was with Hermione and Ron, but I ended up losing both of them to some of the challenges down there. So I went into the final chamber, which had two things. The Mirror of Erised, and Professor Quirrell."

" _Quirrell_?" Draco asked incredulously. "The incompetent, stuttering fool? Who shook like a leaf every time you so much as _breathed_ in his direction?"

The tips of Potter's mouth twitched upwards. "Yeah. That guy. So it turns out, he was- I don't know, _hosting_ Voldemort or something? Voldemort was leeching off of his soul, and he was on the back of Quirrell's head. That's why he always wore a turban- to hide Voldemort."

Draco remembered, with a jolt of fear, the winter of first year, when those Weasley twins had enchanted snowballs to repeatedly hit Quirrell in the back of the head- where Voldemort had been residing, apparently... and when Draco himself had joined in, seeing how much fun they were having. Whoops.

"So he was there, trying to get the Stone. But there was also the Mirror of Erised. Er- the Mirror of Desire. It shows your heart's deepest desire. For example, earlier in the year I stumbled across it in an abandoned classroom, and it showed me stood with my family.

"Ron saw himself winning a Quidditch tournament.

"Dumbledore told me he saw himself with a pair of, um, really nice socks.

"Voldemort- Quirrell- was trying to get the stone, too, and it was down there, but he couldn't find it. He made me look in the Mirror. I saw myself, and mirror-me put the stone into my pocket. When I went to put my hand in my pocket in real life, the stone was there. Dumbledore had enchanted it so it could be taken out of the Mirror, but only by someone who didn't intend to use the Stone for themselves. That's why Quirrell couldn't get it.

"So then Quirrel fought me for the Stone, I ended up accidentally killing him-"

Draco's eyebrows shot up. "Okay, _maybe_ you could accidentally stumble across a Mirror, or into the third-floor corridor, but you cannot _accidentally_ **_kill_** _someone_!"

Potter frowned. "Well, it's more like, when I touched him, he disintegrated. In any case, he died. Then the remnants of Voldemort's soul flew at me and I fainted and woke up in the hospital wing, and I think you know the story from there."

"Yeah, I pretty much knew that." Except for the part about Harry Potter murdering a teacher at age- what, _11_? "But what about the Stone?"

"Well, Voldemort had been drinking unicorn's blood to keep himself alive. He was trying to get the Philosopher's stone so he could-"

"Hold on, the what?"

"Oh, yeah. Nicholas Flamel's stone is called the Philosopher's stone. Anyway, Voldemort wanted it to produce the Elixir of Life, which makes the drinker basically immortal. He wanted it to mainly become human-ish again, with a body and all that. It's alchemy; only Nicholas Flamel is known to have created it successfully, although Beedle the Bard's Resurrection Stone was thought to be based off of it, and that works as it does in the story."

"That's just a children's story, Potter. Everyone knows that. How do you produce to the Elixir of Life from the Stone?"

Potter's eyes widened and darted around the way he did whenever he accidentally revealed something. Ooh, suspicious. "Oh, er, a children's story. Yeah, obviously. 'Course." So he was hiding something. Draco filed that away to think about later. "Er, the Elixir? I'm not sure. Ask Hermione?"

"Is that your answer for everything?"

"Everything I don't know, yeah."

"So, pretty much everything."

"Hey!"

Draco realised with a start that he was smiling; this wasn't the antagonising battle of insults he and Potter had engaged in for the past seven years. This was- banter? And almost-friendly banter at that. Standing abruptly from the unbelievably comfy chair, he said, "Well, thank you for your information. I'll go ask Granger for her information and see if I can get any method of getting the Elixir of Life. Goodbye." And he stepped out of the Room of Requirement, heading towards Gryffindor tower once more.


	4. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, and Scheming Portraits, Stones and Elixirs, and Memories

Draco strode into the Gryffindor common room confidently, head held high. "Granger!" he called, scanning the room. He was shoved up against a wall by a blur of red; Weasley had pinned him to the wall. Oh, look at that. He had his wand at Draco's neck.

"What do you want with Hermione, Malfoy?" he growled.

As Draco was about to retort, Granger came bustling in. "Ron, no, don't worry, it's fine. What is it, Malfoy?" Stepping away from the wall and subtly rubbing at his neck, he gave Granger a nod of thanks.

"Potter doesn't know enough, and he suggested I bring my last query to you."

"Okay..? What is it?"

"Well- maybe not here?" Granger looked around to see the whole common room on edge and glaring at Draco.

As though to prove Draco's point, Weasley said, "As if, Malfoy! I'm not about to let you go off alone with my best friend-"

For once in his life, Potter had perfect timing. "Hey, Ron, 'mione. Malfoy. It's okay, Ron; you can trust him."

Weasley's face went red. " _Trust_ _him_?! Harry, you trusted him so little you stalked him for all of sixth year!"

"But then he was actually _doing_ stuff! Now he's- well, he's still doing stuff, but it's _good_ stuff this time."

"And why should I believe that?"

"Why would I lie to you, Ron? And we know the Imperius curse doesn't work on me." There was a pause, and then Weasley seemed to visibly deflate.

"Alright, mate." He turned to Draco. "You can go, then. But if you do absolutely _anything_ , I will have your head."

"Ooh, was that a threat, Weasley?"

"It was a promise."

" _Okay_ , boys. Malfoy, c'mon. Ron, I'll be fine. Bye, Harry," Granger said, and Draco was pulled out into the corridor.

"Is here okay, Malfoy?"

Draco glanced up and down the empty corridor. "No one _else_ has an invisibility cloak, right?"

The edge of Granger's mouth twitched upwards. "No, not that I know of. So, what was your question?"

"How do you produce the Elixir of Life from the Philosopher's Stone?"

"Ah. Well, I'm not sure I can help with that, either. But, maybe Dumbledore can?" Draco sighed. Was this what it was like with _all_ Gryffindors? Just, 'Oh, I don't know, but here's someone else who might!' over and over again?

"Okay. But, if you hadn't noticed, Dumbledore is sort of dead. Can you bring him back from the grave?"

"No, but have you ever been to the headmaster's office?"

"Obviously."

"Well then, you know that every headmaster or headmistress of Hogwarts-"

"Has a painting up there. I see. Okay then, I'm off. Thank you and goodbye." As Draco walked away, he heard the painting creak open and a far quieter Weasel asking Granger whether Draco had done anything to her. Was he _really_ that untrustworthy? ...Well, yes, but that's not the point. Honestly, you do one thing once and no one lets you forget it. Was that what it was like to be Potter? Draco hated it.

After a long trek up moving, winding staircases, Draco encountered his newest problem. The gargoyle that guarded the entryway to the Headmaster's office. And Draco didn't know the password. He was certain he didn't know enough about McGonagall to even attempt to guess the answer, so he sank down onto the floor to wait for someone to come by.

It had barely even been five minutes when a head of messy black hair rounded the corner. Draco raised an eyebrow. "Couldn't even leave me alone for five minutes, Potter?" There was a strange, slight flush creeping up Potter's neck.

"'Course not, Malfoy. Just thought- you being you- you wouldn't have done anything this year to be called into McGonagall's office, so you wouldn't know the password, so you'd be stuck waiting out here for ages. She's in there at the moment and probably won't come out till it's time to eat. It's 'Sherbet Lemon' now. She was feeling rather sentimental when she set it." As Potter spoke, the gargoyle made a scraping, screeching sound of stone against stone- why were the Hogwarts floors all stone? So cold, so _boring_. They should be thick carpets, like at home. Far more comfortable. The gargoyle revealed an alcove and another twisting staircase.

"So you came running after me to tell me the password so I wouldn't have to wait out here? How chivalrous of you, Potter. Such a Gryffindor."

Potter gave a rather Malfoy-esque sniff and said, "Don't get used to it. Go on, then."

Draco stepped onto the stairs; he felt Potter's eyes on him the whole time he ascended, until the gargoyle moved back and blocked his view.

"Come in," McGonagall said before Draco had even knocked. He opened the door and stepped inside. "Ah, Mr. Malfoy. What is it?" She was sat at the larger wooden desk, the phoenix perched next to her. She set down a stack of papers she was reading as Draco stepped further into the room.

"Please, call me Draco. Mr. Malfoy is my father's name," Draco said, returning subconsciously to the manners he's had drilled into him at McGonagall's formalities.

"Right then. Draco. What can I do for you?"

"Well- actually, I do need to tell you that my transfigurations essay might not be quite up to standard because I'm preoccupied with my version of the Dreamless Sleep potion." McGonagall raised an eyebrow.

"'Not up to standard' from you, Draco, is still better than the average of one Hermione Granger. That won't be a problem, especially given your reasoning. May I ask what specifically is happening now for you to need more time on your Dreamless Sleep potion?"

"Well, that's the other thing I came for." He turned to face the large portrait of Albus Dumbledore, hung on the wall behind him, watching with kindly eyes; and, by extension, the smaller, darker portrait of Severus Snape, hung next to Dumbledore. "Hello, Uncle Severus; Professor. Do you two know about what I've been doing?"

They shook their heads.

Draco explained the rough basics of it before beginning to go into more specific details about what he'd discovered about the Dreamless Sleep potion, what he'd thought and theorised; both wizards nodded along as he spoke. "So I came here to ask if you know how to extract the Elixir of Life from the Philosopher's stone?" He paused, then added, "Or, just, how to make the Stone in general?"

Snape spoke first. "What you've done sounds far too good-willed to be true. Even if this will help you, Draco- why offer it out? Why not sell it? And you said it would be anonymous? Why not even disclose the fact that this discovery was you? You've always taken pride in your work."

He narrowed his eyes at Draco. "Are you okay? Are you under the Imperius curse?"

Dumbledore, in the portrait next to Snape's, laughed. "He's fine, Severus. Just doing some good. Well, my boy, I was good friends with Nicholas; he even offered to disclose the brewing instructions to me. Alas, I refused. Being at Hogwarts the majority of the time put the recipe in too much danger, and I wouldn't have used it anyway.

"I do know that to get the Elixir of Life, you have to liquify the stone in its entirety, and add your heart's deepest desire. Then you extract it- it's a sort of shimmery gold, Nicholas told me once. He said you had to say, _'Extractum Aeterna Aurea Vitae'_ seven times as you withdrew the Elixir from the liquid; no more, no less, or the potion would lose all magical properties.

"And, while I can tell you that, I am, unfortunately, unable to say anything else; I do not even know anything else, in this form." He gestured to his painted body. "Perhaps, though, there may be some choice memories by my pensieve you could view? I give my full permission for you to do so."

"And," Snape interjected, "When you next go down to work on your potion, take me with you. Or just any portrait, and I can follow you. I want to observe your work."

Draco nodded. It would help to have his godfather there; Severus had always been a mentor for him, especially in potions.

"My pensieve and memories are over there," Dumbledore said, gesturing to a wardrobe-type thing. Draco stepped closer, and the doors opened. A pensieve floated out. Behind it stood racks and racks of vials, all filled with shimmering memories. "Do you know how to use a pensieve?" Dumbledore asked.

Draco knew the rough concept, but he'd never actually used a pensieve before. His father had one in his office, but Draco had been forbidden to enter that room. In the moment that he hesitated, Dumbledore smiled.

"I thought as such. Harry, come out from under that cloak, my boy." Draco whirled around, and, sure enough, Potter emerged from under the cloak, looking almost sheepish but not quite guilty enough to manage to pull of the expression.

As Draco began to make a noise of outrage and protest, Dumbledore spoke up again. "You know how the pensieve works; since Draco here is going to be doing you, specifically, such a favour with ridding you of nightmares, it seems only fair you should help him. Why don't you go into the pensieve together? Perhaps Harry could also help with the potion itself, now that he knows what you're doing for the potion and how it will be used, and also how to extract the Elixir. Go on, then. Have a look. The second rack, row three, third along from the right."

Draco was pretty much seething. The old man must've known Potter was there all along! He glanced at Severus, to see if he was just as angry as Draco, but he was- he was _smirking_?! Oh! The _betrayal_! He'd known Potter was there too!

Draco's jaw dropped open; Severus, seeing the connection Draco had made, snickered. Even angrier at the fact that now he had been tricked into disclosing absolutely everything to Potter- of all people! Why was it always _Potter_?- and now it made _sense_ for Potter to be the one to help him, despite him being absolutely _useless_ at potions- he stomped over to the cabinet containing the memories, where Potter was stood behind the pensieve, holding the memory Dumbledore had suggested. (He looked, in that moment, like an angry child throwing a tantrum.)

Potter poured the memory into the pensieve, and said, "Malfoy, just do what I do. It's so easy, I did it without even meaning to my first time. You can't really mess up. Just follow me." He leaned forwards, plunged his face into the thin pool of water, swirling with memories, and then kept going forwards until he was gone into the Pensieve.

Draco glanced around one last time. Severus and Dumbledore were watching him expectantly; Fawkes was now playing with a cat with round, spectacle-shaped markings around its eyes; McGonagall had disappeared, the papers she'd been reading still on her desk. Draco leaned forwards, and, with a rather awful tumbling sensation, fell into Dumbledore's memory- and straight into Harry Potter.


	5. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, Nicholas Flamel and the Bargaining of the Deathly Hallows

" _Ow_! Watch it, Malfoy. Merlin, you're heavy," Potter groaned from beneath Draco. He'd been pushed to the ground when Draco came tumbling out of the sky, providing a soft landing.

Draco stood up without an apology, looking around them.

Where were they?

Great green hills rose above to the left, slowly receding into the horizon. Behind them, acres of forest stretched out in a canopy of leaves and branch-laden undergrowth, full of winding paths and little dirt trails that criss-crossed all over the place. To the right, plains of tall golden wheat; and, situated in the middle of one such field, lay a cottage.

The cottage was small, cosy, sweet; a plume of smoke rose from its chimney. It was only two stories tall. Its windows were alight, the curtains parted. The walls were a soft beige, the roof slatted rows of weathered stone. The door, too, looked weathered. It was wooden, with little lines and knobbles from whatever tree it was grown; softened over the years.

"Potter, look," Draco said. He set off in the direction of the cottage, not waiting for Potter. 

As he neared the small building, he noticed that there was a strong magic around the place; it flowed through the air, laced the wind and was imbued in the ground; it kept the forest wild, kept the fields golden, kept the sky clear. There were layers of it; veils, almost. Draco supposed those were wards. In a memory, he could feel them, but they wouldn't affect him. Hopefully.

When Draco reached the front door, he hesitated before knocking. He turned, pursing his lips slightly; he hated asking for help, or admitting he didn't know something. That implied he had weaknesses, and Malfoys don't have weaknesses. "Potter, as we are in a memory, are we astral?"

Potter blinked owlishly. "What?"

Draco sighed. "Are we physically here, or are we like- like ghosts? Can we pass through walls and such?"

"Er," Potter said, "I'm not sure."

"Fat lot of help you are," Draco muttered under his breath. "Potter knows about memories and pensieves, Draco, you should take Potter along, he can help you. Meddling old codger, Potter's bloody useless," he continued as he made his way around the house, looking for open windows or other ways to enter. He returned to Potter without finding another way of entering. "Well, Potter, don't just stand there. Do something. How do we get in?" An idea struck him. He loved having fun, and this was a prime opportunity. "Oh, maybe we _aren't_ physical. Potter, try walking through the walls, like you do at Platform 9 3/4. Maybe you'll get in." This relied on Potter's utter lack of intelligence, and also his never-ending supply of trust for others.

"Er- okay, Malfoy," he said, walking towards the wall at a normal speed. Draco was certain he'd walk face-first into the wall, and fall over-

Potter walked straight through the wall.

Because, of _course_ , _everything_ works for Harry _Potter_. 

Draco followed, still internally cursing Potter's unbelievable luck.

Inside, an old man sat on a wooden rocking chair, the same wood as the door was. A fire roared in the fireplace before him, emitting the plume of smoke Draco had spied from outside. 

He reminded Draco of Slughorn; the same wispy hair lingered on the side of his head, the same pudginess surrounded his figure.

His most distinctive feature, however, was his beard.

It was easily as long as he was tall; wiry grey and thin, but so very long. He was stroking it as he watched the flames flicker.

Potter stood a little to Draco's left, watching the old man. Draco stepped further into the room. As he did, the old man turned around. "Ah, so Albus finally sent someone through. Hello. Who are you?"

Draco was going to politely introduce himself, apologise for intruding, and explain his circumstances and ask for Nicholas Flamel when Potter (very rudely) burst out with, "You can see us?"

Draco turned to him, raised an eyebrow, turned pointedly to the wall behind him, and said, "No, Potter, I think he's talking to the _wall_. Yes, I think we are visible."

The old man smiled. "Yes, I can see you. Potter, eh? By any chance, would that be James Potter? You match his description quite well... Oh, wait, no, there was another one, wasn't there? Found my Stone and so I had to give up the Elixir. What was his name? Hagrid? No... H... Harry?"

"Er, yes, that's me. Sorry, it's just- Malfoy and I are in a memory right now, and you shouldn't be able to see us..."

The old man nodded. "Yes. Well, when the Potter boy- that's you, I suppose- found my Stone in your first year at Hogwarts, I had to give up my Elixir so it wouldn't get into the wrong sort of hands, especially with that Tom Riddle back again. I wasn't quite ready to go yet, however; so I stored all of my memories in this one vial, which I gave to Albus for safekeeping. He comes, sometimes, to see how I am, although he hasn't come in a while...

"Oh, if you're here, does that mean that Tom is gone? I don't suppose you'd be here if he was still around." Potter nodded his affirmation. "Right. Well done. I suppose _you're_ the one who got rid of him, as Harry Potter. Well, in any case. I told Albus to send someone through if they needed my help in any way, but only if they _truly_ needed my help. So, how can I help you two?"

"Well-" 

"No, Potter, you don't understand most of it, and what you _do_ understand confuses you. Let me. 

"Firstly- may I assume you are Nicholas Flamel?" The man nodded. "Okay, thank you. So, the war is over, as you guessed. We both played rather big roles in the war; so did many of our friends.

"My name is Draco Malfoy, and I am an aspiring Potioneer. I attempted- am attempting- to make a derivative of the Dreamless Sleep potion that is non-addictive.

"I believe I've found the solution- the unicorn's blood. I believe the blood, instead of cursing the drinker, makes them addicted to the potion. But the unicorn's blood also counters the fatal bits of the potion. I took the unicorn's blood out to remove the addictive attributes, but I can't find anything stronger to replace it to keep the drinker alive... And so I went to the smartest girl in our year for help." Potter gave Draco a strange look. _What_? Just 'cause Draco didn't particularly like her didn't mean he didn't acknowledge her intelligence. "She and Potter here helped me realise I needed your Philosopher's stone to produce the Elixir of Life. We don't need to become immortal; just to combat the fatalness of the Powdered root of Asphodel, the Infusion of Wormwood and the Valerian Sprigs together. So... could you help us?"

"Hmm... Yes, I could."

"Brilliant!" Potter exclaimed. 

"But... why should I? This won't benefit me in any way. I'm only a memory now- literally. I am in the history books, I don't need money, I'm safe and happy... Why should I help you?"

Ooh, Draco liked this Flamel guy. He was a bargainer, huh? Well, Draco grew up a Slytherin with Pansy Parkinson. He could bargain. 

"So- you're famous. You're not hungry, or poor, or in need of anything physical; you're living in your own personal paradise, surrounded by magic, protected. You're not sad. But do you have everything you could ever want? Everything you could ever need?"

"Yes, I do believe so."

Potter, who had been watching the conversation with a frown, spoke up. "Say, Mr. Flamel, when was the last time Dumbledore visited?"

Flamel, seeming slightly thrown-off, turned to Potter. "Well, I'm not quite sure, actually. Time passes differently here than it does in the real world. It feels like it's been years, though. Say, when you leave, could you ask him to come through sometime?"

Potter's expression turned sad. Draco turned away as Potter said, quietly, darting a glance at Draco, "Albus Dumbledore died two years ago, Mr. Flamel."

Flamel's shock was palpable. He froze up, his eyes widened and his mouth parted; he made as though to stand up from his chair in outrage, but then sank down, looking visibly crushed. "Oh," he said, and his voice was quiet, too. "Oh."

But, Potter, with his utter lack of decorance or etiquette or manners or just general awareness of others' emotions, kept going. "I bet it gets a little lonely here, right?"

Still shocked, Flamel nodded jerkily. "Y- yes, a little." 

Draco thought he knew where Potter was going with this, and he didn't like it one bit.

"Well, what if we brought him here for you?"

Flamel's head shot up. "What do you mean? Actually, how are you here if Albus is- is dead?"

Potter grinned; a sly grin, like he'd won already and he knew it. "Well, he's now a portrait; you could hang him up on your wall, keep him with you."

Flamel, obviously putting up a brave facade, looked up at Potter cockily. "And just how would you do that, Potter?"

Potter stalled. "Er- well- um-"

"Hopeless," Draco muttered under his breath, but Potter's bringing up loneliness had sparked an idea for him. "Say, Mr. Flamel,"

"Yes?"

"You had a wife, right?"

He looked wistful. "Yeah. Yeah, I did. Perenelle. Sweet El. What of her?"

"Is she here with you?"

He turned sad. "No, she isn't. She died before she could add her memories to mine to join me here..."

"Well, what if she could join you?"

"And just how, young man, would you manage that? She isn't even a portrait."

. . .

And here, Malfoy hit the same problem Harry had. But Harry had been given an idea by Malfoy's idea.

"Well, do you know Beedle the Bard? And his stories?"

"Yes, Mr. Potter, what self-respecting wizard doesn't?"

Harry thought about how he hadn't known until he was seventeen. But that wasn't his fault! In any case. 

"Well, you know the story about the Deathly Hallows?"

"The Elder Wand, the Invisibility Cloak, and the Resurrection Stone. That was modelled after my Philosopher's stone, you know."

"Yes. Well- they're real."

Malfoy and Flamel reacted the same way. 

Their jaws dropped open, their eyes widening comically. Then Malfoy shut his mouth with a snap, turned away, arms crossed, scoffing, while Flamel continued to look at Harry in amazement. 

"Give me proof," he said. 

Harry reached out and took his invisibility cloak from where he'd stuffed it in his pocket after being caught in McGonagall's office. He pulled it around himself, disappearing under the material as he did; he left his head out to prove he hadn't just cast some spell of sorts.

Flamel raised his chin, looking skeptical. "There were invisibility cloaks around when I was alive," he proclaimed. "Why should I believe that that is the cloak of the tale? And what does this have to do with bringing my El back?"

"Well, the Resurrection stone. It does only bring back a spectral version of the person, but... Well, you're Nicholas Flamel. Surely you could come up with a way to make it permanent and full."

Flamel's eyes lit up. "Yes, yes, yes. I sent Beedle ideas on how to improve the Resurrection stone, but he ignored me. But, theoretically, they would work on the actual stone perfectly... Where is this stone, Potter? Bring it to me, prove it works, and leave me with it, and I will tell you how to make the Philosopher's stone."

Harry looked up confidently. "Deal."


	6. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Ronald Weasley and Common Sense

As soon as they left the pensieve, Draco rounded on Potter. "What were you _thinking_?! First, you tell him the only person who visits him is _dead_ , then you breach the subject of his _also_ _dead_ wife, and then you tell him that a _children's_ _story_ _tale_ is _real_ and that you can bring his wife back from the _dead_ \- Potter, do you have no _subtlety_? Are all Gryffindors so brash and careless?"

Snape, watching on from the side, said, "Yes, Draco, they all are. Every single one. Absolutely insufferable, the lot of them."

"How do you even plan to get the resurrection stone?! Wait, scrap that. How do you know it even works?"

"Well, because I've used it, obviously."

Draco blanched. "You've _used_ it?! You have used one of the _Deathly_ _Hallows_ -"

"Two," Potter said, holding up his cloak.

"- _two_ of the _Deathly_ _Hallows_ -"

"Three," said Dumbledore, behind the two. Draco whirled around to face him.

" ** _Three_**?! But- but there are only _three_ Hallows!"

Dumbledore smiled. "Yes, Draco, there are. The Cloak, the Stone, and the Elder Wand."

Draco threw his hands in the air, turning back to face Potter. "And just _how_ , _Potter_ , did you get your hands on the _Elder_ _Wand_?!" 

"Er- Malfoy, it was actually from you."

Draco's mouth dropped open. " _Wh_ -"

"Y'know- sixth year, the astronomy tower," Potter begun. Draco glanced aside, folding his arms defensively, but Potter blustered on. "Dumbledore had possession of the Elder Wand at that moment in time. To own the Elder Wand, you have to defeat its previous owner."

"But- Snape killed Dumbledore- I haven't defeated Snape-"

"No, but you disarmed Dumbledore. That counted as defeating him. You, from that moment, had control of the Elder Wand."

Draco's mind was whirling. He'd- he'd held such power, and not even _known_?

"Then, at Malfoy Manor- when we got caught by the Snatchers, and Hermione disfigured my face, I took your wand from you. Then I gained control of the Elder Wand."

"Oh Merlin," Draco murmured, lowering himself to the ground so he wouldn't fall over from the shock of it all.

"Actually, it was instrumental in killing Voldemort. In that final battle between us, he had the physical Elder Wand, but I had its allegiance. He tried to kill me with it, but couldn't, because the wand didn't obey him, it obeyed me, and it refused to kill me. Hey, Malfoy, if you hadn't disarmed Dumbledore that night on the Astronomy tower I would've died."

"Oh dear Merlin," Draco breathed.

"Potter, shut your obnoxious mouth. You're going to give Draco a heart attack. Now, what's this about needing the resurrection stone?"

"Wait!" Draco shouted, scrambling to his feet and pointing a finger at Potter. "If you- if you had control of all the Hallows- that means- that means you would've been the- the Master of Death!"

Potter blinked. "Er, yeah, I suppose so."

"What the- _Harry_ _Potter_ , how in _Merlin's_ name are you so calm about knowing you were, at one point, the literal _master_ of _Death_?!" 

"Well, I've died twice. Doesn't get much more shocking than that."

" ** _TWICE_**?!"

"Alright, boys, settle down," Dumbledore said with a chuckle. "So, what are you doing next? Something to do with the Deathly Hallows, I assume?"

"Yeah," Potter replied calmly as Draco proceeded to have a mental meltdown. "Flamel wasn't all that into giving us the stone's recipe for nothing. He wanted something in return, so we ended up offering the Resurrection stone so he could resurrect his wife."

"Ah, I feared he would be like that. I hope he didn't cause too much trouble. Well, how are you two going to get the Stone?"

"Well, when I walked into the Forbidden Forest in the Battle of Hogwarts, I used it to summon my parents and Sirius. Then, when I got close, I just- sorta- threw it aside, I suppose."

Draco, who had been calming down with Occlumency tips from Severus, immediately lost any regained composure as he screeched, "You had the _Resurrection_ _Stone_ and you just _threw_ _it_ _aside_?!" 

Potter blinked again. "Um- yeah. So- we'll have to look through the Forest, I suppose."

McGonagall, sat at her desk, spoke up. "I'm going to pretend not to have heard any of this conversation. I am also going to pretend not to have told you that Filch won't be roaming the castle tonight, and neither will Mrs. Norris."

Potter grinned. "Thanks, Professor. C'mon Malfoy, let's go."

As they left, Draco kept up a running stream of insults to the Gryffindor house and their reckless, rule-breaking idiocy, to the Deathly Hallows, to the Forbidden Forest, to Dumbledore and Flamel and mostly, to moronic, messy-haired boys with no sense of self-preservation and an endless resource of bravery who have _mastered_ _Death_ and died- _twice-_ and killed a mass-murderer and lived life from one adventure to the next.

That night, Draco met Potter by the edge of the Forbidden Forest. They exchanged a glance and a nod, and then walked in together, side by side, illuminated wands held high. 

Draco was on-edge; every crack of a branch or rustle of leaves not caused by himself made him tense up and glance around. Potter led the way, mostly, seeming to know exactly where he was going although they had long ago strayed from the path, but made sure Draco stayed right by his side.

Eventually they reached a small clearing; the leafy canopy still hung heavy overhead, letting only little bits of moonlight shine through. A ring of trees surrounded the area. When Potter confirmed that the stone would be somewhere here, Draco let him start looking while he cast spells.

Firstly, he went around the clearing, casting protective, silencing and disillusionment charms. Then, he pointed his wand at the sky and said, " _Manere_ , _Fortissimi_ _Lux._ " An orb of light, brighter than a Lumos and larger, rose into the air. It hovered above the clearing, illuminating the ground. Draco squinted against the bright light, then turned to where Potter was still searching, having now tucked his wand into his back pocket. 

Draco tucked his wand into the inside pocket of his furry grey coat, bent over and joined him, rustling through the leaves with his hands.

It would be a long night.

"I give up," Potter announced after about half an hour of searching.

"Weakling," Draco replied, although he had been about to suggest a break; his arms ached, his fingers felt like they were about to fall off from the cold- his nose, too- and his back was screaming from being bent over for so long.

"Shut up, Malfoy, I could still best you in a duel right now and we both know it. Anyway, don't you think we should ask for help? It would go faster doing this with more people."

"See, that sounds good, except I don't want to tell more people about my potion. And, besides, who do you think would actually come and join us if we told them we were looking for the Resurrection Stone? Or even just any old stone? They'd think we'd gone mad."

"Well, I guess, but what if we told people who already knew about the Stone? And who knew about what you were doing?"

"What? Potter, who are you thinking of? Spit it out."

"Ron and Hermione."

"No."

"Malfoy, look-"

"Alright, so, perhaps Granger, but Weasley? Absolutely not."

"Malfoy-"

"Granger or nothing, Potter."

Potter gave Draco the most exasperated look, then sighed. "Fine. Let's go get Hermione."

. . . 

The two stepped into Gryffindor common room. The lights were out, the windows shut against the cold air. The fireplace was empty, and without it, the place looked almost unwelcoming; barren, devoid of life. Cold. Empty.

Harry walked over to the staircases. He gestured to the one on the left, indicating that Granger was up there. He stepped back to let Malfoy go first. He remembered the fact that the staircases turned into slides if a boy tried to go up them; he smirked to himself as Malfoy passed him. This would be brilliant.

He watched as Malfoy set foot on the stairs.

And kept going.

Of bloody _course_ the staircases don't send prim, proper, rule-abiding _Malfoy_ tumbling down them. 

Malfoy made his way up the stairs, oblivious to Harry's unbelieving expression. When he was nearly at the top, he turned back to see Harry, gaping up at him. "Nice view, Potter?" he whispered. Potter's mouth snapped shut and he started hissing something at Malfoy, stepping up onto the staircase-

. . .

Draco, still half-turned around, fell, as the staircase flattened out and turned into a ramp. He scrambled for purchase, clawing at the walls, as Potter slipped back slightly. For the second time, Draco fell onto Potter.

" _Ow_! Potter, what in the name of _Merlin_ was that?!"

"I don't know! At some point a rule was made that boys can't go into the girl's dormitories, and the stairs transform into a slide whenever you try to go up." He paused. "Say, Malfoy, are you actually a girl?"

Draco remembered the one time he'd tried on one of Pansy's dresses in Fourth year, before the Yule Ball. "No, Potter, don't be ridiculous. Why don't they let you up?"

"I guess 'cause I'm a Gryffindor boy? Maybe it only works on Gryffindors?"

"Maybe. Well, Ill go get Granger. Wait down here."

Granger proved very easy to wake up.

She also slept with her wand clutched in her hand, hidden under her pillow.

She was also _far_ more threatening than Weasley with her wand pointing at one's throat.

Draco found all of this out in less than five seconds.

Granger blinked. "Malfoy?" Her eyes narrowed slightly. "What are you doing?"

Draco moved her wand aside slowly. "Potter's in the common room. We need you."

The trio didn't start talking until they were out of the castle, headed towards the forest. Through the trees, Draco could see his _Fortissima_ _Lux_ glowing faintly.

"Hey, 'mione. Sorry to wake you up."

"It's- it's fine, Harry. But- why Malfoy? Why now? Why do you need _me_?"

"Well- the stairs let Malfoy up but not me, so he had to go wake you. Now, because now is when we decided we needed you. We need you because you know what Malfoy's doing and somewhat trust him, also trust me, and know about the Resurrection stone."

"Oh, no. Harry, what do mean, the Resurrection Stone? I thought you threw that away in the Forbidden Forest?"

"Er- yeah, I did. But, well, we need it as a bargaining chip against Flamel for the Philosopher's Stone, and we need help to find it. So... Help?"

"I'll see what I can do."

When they reached the clearing, Granger went around and checked Draco's spells. When she'd made a full circle of the clearing, she turned to Potter. "Harry, these are really good. Have you been practicing them?"

"The- what?"

"The shields and wards around here."

"Huh?"

"I did that, Granger," Draco interrupted. She turned on him.

"You did?"

"Well, I didn't want to be defenceless while digging through leaves. And, I suppose, it wouldn't look very good if I came out of the Forest with Potter dead. _Again_."

She looked skeptical, but nonetheless impressed. "Well, they're impressive. And is that a _Fortissima_ _Lux_?" 

Draco beamed. So there _were_ intelligent Gryffindors! "Yeah, it is. Took me ages to master it."

"I've been trying for _months_. I can't get it. How do you-"

"Guys," Potter said. "Sorry to interrupt your bonding, but we have a Hallow to look for. 'Mione, why don't you try spells? Malfoy and I can talk you through what happened as you try them."

They spent about another hour telling Granger what had happened, and digging through the leaves nearer the edge of the clearing, working their way inwards. 

Another half hour later, Draco could've sworn his fingers were going blue. 

Granger threw down her wand. "I don't know what it is! It just won't work. Maybe 'cause it's a Hallow? I don't know. Sorry, Harry. We're going to have to do this the hard way."

Potter sighed and turned to Draco. "Please can we get Ron? It would go faster, and I'm sure you're tired of searching like this..."

Draco hesitated, looked at the frozen ground and his frozen hands, then sighed. "Oh, all right then. Let's go get the Weasel."

Potter went up to fetch Weasley. They came down together talking quietly; when Weasley saw Draco, he stiffened, but his hand only clenched into a fist, not moving even an inch towards his wand. Granger gave Weasley a proud look from behind Draco, and he gave her a tentative smile.

Potter and Granger took turns explaining the story to Weasley as they made their way down to the forest again. Draco's _Fortissima_ _Lux_ was fading; it wouldn't stay for another half hour, at best, and Draco doubted he could cast another one successfully. He was so tired and cold and just plain miserable. 

When they arrived at the clearing, Weasley glanced around at the floor, then pointed around the clearing and shouted, " _Accio_ Resurrection Stone!"

A small grey blur flew out of a pile of leaves and into Weasley's hand.

"Oh my _God_ ," Hermione breathed.

Draco walked over to the nearest tree and began hitting his head against it repeatedly.

Potter burst into laughter; loud, bellowing laughter that bounced of the trees and ricocheted further into the woods. 

Weasley just stood there, holding the Stone. 

Draco turned to him. "Weasley, we spent over _three_ _hours_ digging through the leaves for that-" he hit his head back against the tree again and groaned, "And you found with an _accio_."

"Well, what can I say," he said, starting to smile. "Common sense. Beats talent, skill and pure dumb luck every time."

Granger walked over to the nearest tree to her and started hitting her head against its trunk.

Draco sunk down to the floor in despair as Weasley joined Potter in laughing his head off. 


	7. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, and the Wolves of the Forest

The boys waited until the next day to return to the pensieve and Flamel. When the sun's rays glinted off the black lake and the trees were aglow in the sunrise, they made their way back up to McGonagall's office, both too tired from the previous night to do much more than move one foot in front of the other. At one point they had to stop because Potter had gotten himself stuck in the trick stair, and Draco spent a good ten minutes trying to get him out.

When they finally reached McGonagall's office, the sun had risen further, now peaking over the tops of the trees of the Forbidden Forest. Draco entered the office first. Severus behind him gave him a nod of greeting. Dumbledore wasn't in his portrait. McGonagall sat, wide awake and reading her papers again, at her desk. As Potter entered and immediately tripped over Draco, sending them both sprawling (and Severus sniggering from his portrait) McGonagall looked up. One glance at the boys and she waved her wand in the general direction of the cupboard to the left of the pensieve's one. Out of it flew two Pepperup potions; Draco tipped his head back and drank it immediately, blinking away his lingering tiredness. He made his way over to the pensieve cupboard, watched it float out slowly, Flamel's memory still lingering from yesterday. He didn't look over at Potter to see if he was ready before going face-first into the potion again.

He didn't land on his feet; instead he attempted to roll as he landed. He realised, as he tried this, that he had landed on a hill. And he was rolling down it.

He went tumbling down the side of the hill, distantly noting that it was night here as the sky and the ground blurred together in an indistinguishable mess of muted colours and grass. 

As he stood up, brushing off grass blades from his robes, Potter came tumbling into his feet, sending Draco down again. Bloody Gryffindors.

When the two had managed to organise themselves, they took in their surroundings.

This wasn't where they'd appeared last time.

They were at the base of a hill; to one side rose the great sloping side of the hill they'd rolled down, and to the other lay a- a wasteland, pretty much.

Flat, barren plains, bits of rubble scattered here and there, concrete patches worn and melted into dirt and dust. Heat seemed to radiate off of it, engulfing Draco where he stood.

Potter moved towards it.

"No, you moron," Draco said, grabbing his robes. "Potter, honestly. We don't know where we are, we could've been trapped somewhere, and you want to go _into_ that place?"

"Well. what do _you_ suggest we do, Malfoy?"

Draco rolled his eyes. "Get the high ground, obviously. Have you never done strategizing, ever? You fought a _war_! Well, in any case. The idea, Potter, is that you get up somewhere high; not only is it easier to defend from oncoming attackers, it also provides a good vantage point. Come on now, hup-hup. Up we go."

They made their way up quietly. For all Draco's wit and joking at the base of the hill, where they were hidden from whatever lay on the other side of this hill, he was rather nervous. He was in foreign territory; he didn't know where he was or who else might be here, and while he trusted Potter with his life (he already owed him a life debt; how couldn't he?) and he knew Potter was more than capable of defending them both, Draco knew he was almost entirely incompetent in offense. He was unbelievably talented at defense, but if he was asked to attack... he just couldn't. He'd always been taught that the best form of offense was a good defense.

They mounted the hill. It appeared to be the highest of a series of hills; behind him, he could see that flat wasteland, stretching out to the horizon. To his left was a forest- with a sigh of relief, Draco recognised it as the forest he and Potter had fallen into the last time they'd arrived here. Before him, over a rolling landscape of hills, lay the plains, and- there it was- Flamel's modest little cabin. 

Draco pointed it out to Potter, and they started making their way down the hill. About a third of the way down, Potter muttered, "Oh, I'm done with this," lay down, and went rolling down the hill. Draco watched, incredulous, at Potter's absolute lack of care for his clothes and his honour... although he _was_ moving faster than Draco.

But Draco's pride wouldn't let him roll down the hill like a four-year-old, so he kept walking. 

When Draco reached the bottom of the hill, Potter was halfway up the next one. When he reached the top, Potter was at the bottom. Draco looked around him; determining that Potter was, indeed, the only other person who could see Draco, he lay down hesitantly, and then lost control and went rolling down the hill. When he reached the bottom, he rolled a little up the next one. He stood up, but while rolling, his robes had tangles themselves. Above him, Potter snickered, watching Draco struggle with the expensive fabric that had knotted and twisted itself around him. He turned around, trying to see an end of the mess, but just fell over. Potter's snickers turned into snorts of laughter. Draco looked up from the floor at him, glaring, and he started wheezing. 

A few minutes of struggling and breathless laughter later, Draco finally turned to Potter and said, "Help." 

"Hmm... Not sure I will, Malfoy. It's quite entertaining, seeing you all tied up like this."

Draco's eyes glinted dangerously. "Potter..."

He laughed as he made his way down to Draco. "Alright, alright. Look- here-" He pulled on one strip of fabric, just out of Draco's view, and the whole mess unraveled.

Trying to save his dignity as much as he could, Draco stuck his nose in the air, brushed off his robes, and gave a snooty "Thank you." before carrying on up the hill, past a still-smiling Potter.

He rolled down the rest of the hills, levitating his robes behind him so as to not get tangled up in them again, finally coming to a stop on the plains. Potter rolled down beside him, and stood, staring at the cabin with him. By now the full moon had risen and hung nearly overhead; the cabin's lights were out, and no smoke emerged from the chimney. The curtains were drawn, the door shut firmly, and Draco could feel that the magic in the wards were stronger.

Potter went ahead of him; about halfway there, he froze. He was staring at something in the forest, far enough away that Draco couldn't see. He made his way over to Potter; when he saw what Potter had, he froze, too.

Lingering on the fringes of the woods behind the cabin were two glowing yellow eyes. 

Surrounding them were what must have been dozens of black figures, hidden in shadow, but Draco could make out all too well what they were. 

Shaggy beasts, stood tall on their hind legs.

The one with the bright yellow eyes growled; a low, menacing sound that reverberated through the ground, shaking Draco's bones. The rest of the group growled in response.

Potter adjusted his stance slightly; his left foot moved backwards and pivoted him so he was facing the forest. He raised his wand, too, crouched down but head up, eyes trained on the pack. When he spoke, his voice was quiet but strong.

"Werewolves."


	8. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, the Werewolf Pack and the Fight

As soon as the word had left Potter's mouth, the pack leader advanced. The pack followed. Potter immediately whirled round and started sprinting off away from the pack.

Draco, however, stood still, paralysed with fear; there were so many of the beasts, all stood high on their hind legs, growling and snarling, baring razor-sharp teeth, yellowed eyes glinting. Behind him, Potter skidded to a halt when he realised Draco wasn't with him. He turned back (his saviour complex would get him killed someday- it already had, actually), grabbed Draco's arm, and set off in a sprint again. Draco tripped and stumbled after him; he was usually fast, but he'd been taken by surprise.

He threw a glance over his shoulder; the pack had lowered themselves, and were clearly about to start running. "Bloody hell," Potter muttered from ahead of him. Draco didn't have time to ask before Potter cast a lightening charm on him and picked him up, bridal style, so he could run faster and not worry about Draco being bitten or hurt.

Draco had a sudden and incredibly inappropriate flashback to one night with Pansy in the Slytherin dormitories; the night he'd come out to her as gay. She'd given him that oh-so-infuriating look and asked, slyly, who'd been his "awakening". She'd then spent the next ten minutes trying to convince Draco he was gay for _Potter_. He didn't confirm any of her suspicions- obviously- but in Potter's arms, seeing him as a strong, young- admittedly handsome- man rather than a childhood nemesis, Draco saw how he could have. 

_Not_ _the_ _time!_ he shouted at himself mentally. As if to reinforce this, he spotted a werewolf over Potter's shoulder, quickly gaining on them; Draco suddenly realised that while Potter was running from the wolves (and doing surprisingly well, considering he was only human, after all), Draco himself was doing nothing. Immediately, he raised his wand, looking away from the wolves to focus his concentration on himself and Potter; he was useless at offensive magic, but his defensive was above average. 

He pointed his wand at Potter and himself, muttered under his breath, making shield charms around the both of them. Then he made more specific anti-werewolf defences around Potter first, and then himself.

The reason he was so good at defensive magic was because he'd had to learn some from his mother when his home had been plagued by Death Eaters and by Voldemort himself, when his father hadn't been able to help him. One of the Death Eaters he'd lived with had been Fenrir Greyback, the werewolf infamous for attacking children. Narcissa had made absolutely sure that Draco knew how to defend himself from werewolves.

Now, that knowledge was paying off; as the leader of the pack advanced rapidly on the pair, it seemed to pause for a second, thrown off by Draco's repellent charms.

Potter had begun to slow in his sprint; he was losing energy, and he would need energy for the inevitable duel. Draco forced himself out of Potter's arms, knowing they'd need both their wands to stand even a slight chance against the wolves.

As soon as he landed, he cast more permanent shields and wards on the ground, giving the boys an area of about four feet squared that the werewolves would struggle to enter. But he knew that the wolves still could, with effort, and definitely would, and that was where Potter would come in with his DADA magic.

The wolves were on the boys almost immediately. The personal repellent wards the two had around them didn't extend far enough to affect the wolves, so only the physical shields were acting against them.

Beside him, Potter watched as the first few wolves slammed into the shield confusedly; he glanced at Draco, wand at the ready, and figured it out.

Still out of breath and panting, he assumed his own battling stance. 

Draco couldn't say how long he and Potter stood there, warding off the wolves with as many spells as they could think of; they tried absolutely everything, from jinxes and inconveniencing charms to hexes and curses. Draco could tell that the wolves wouldn't be driven off; he and Potter would have to wait them out till sunrise, probably, unless Flamel came to help. Draco doubted he would.

Draco's shields wouldn't last much longer; especially not with Draco sleep-deprived, stressed and already weakened by fear. Something needed to happen for the two to escape with their lives.

Potter seemed to be casting every spell that came to mind. Draco, personally, was working his way back from what he'd learned most recently to what he'd learned first; he was going through Second Year when he remembered another time he and Potter had dueled together; only then, they'd been against each other. Draco had cast a spell, and Potter had- oh.

"Serpensortia!" he shouted. A snake shot out of the end of his wand.

Potter didn't spare him a glance, but shouted, "What are you doing?" as Draco cast the spell again. And again, until the two were surrounded by a writhing mass of serpents.

"Talk to them!" Draco yelled back. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw understanding flash across Potter's face.

"Cover me!" Potter said, and he bent down and started hissing at the snakes. In a couple of seconds, the snakes were slithering forwards; they started diving at the wolves, hissing and biting as much as they could.

Potter arose and rejoined Draco in shouting spells at the pack.

After what couldn't have been more than ten minutes but felt closer to an hour, Draco spotted the biggest wolf- the leader- headed for himself and Potter. He turned to take on the wolf, readying his repertoire of spells, when Potter dove at him; he pushed Draco down as another werewolf soared over Draco's head, only barely missing where he'd been stood moments ago, teeth bared such that they would've closed around his neck if not for Potter's intervention. The werewolf, unable to stop, kept flying- straight into the leader. Its jaws closed around the larger wolf's lower neck; the werewolf howled in agony and immediately began a retreat into the forest. The pack followed, dragging injured wolves by the scruffs of their necks, until the grass fields were empty, and the trees hid the dangers lurking within.

Draco turned around to thank Potter for saving him when a heavy weight slumped against his back- he looked over his shoulder, alarmed, to find Potter- had he passed out?- resting against him. Draco sighed. _Idiotic_ , _reckless_ , _foolish_ _Gryffindors_ , he thought, as he moved to let Potter lie down on the grass. He cast a new round of shielding spells and resigned himself to keeping watch for the night until the sun rose and he and Potter could swap the Resurrection Stone for the Philosopher's stone recipe. But until then, Potter needed rest.

Had she been there, Pansy would've said he seemed almost affectionate.


	9. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, Nicholas Flamel, and the Exchange

When the sun's rays began to finally peak over the hills Draco and Potter had descended from, Draco decided enough was enough. He'd lost count of how many wards he'd cast; his eyes ached from observing the same landscape over and over. His skin prickled from the cold, his lips had long ago turned numb, and his fingers seemed frozen in a tight grip on his wand. Still, he hadn't left his position by Potter's side the entire night.

Now, he cast a Levicorpus, and had Potter follow him over the plains and to Flamel's house.

By the time he and Potter's body had reached the small abode, the sun had risen considerably, its rays now warming the frozen ground, chasing away the coldness of the night.

Flamel's windows were lit, curtains parted once more. Draco stepped through the wall.

"Ah, Mr. Malfoy," Flamel greeted him. "I presume you have the Stone?"

Skipping straight to the subject, then, and not one question asked about the unconscious, floating Chosen One behind Draco. "Yes."

Flamel clapped his hands and rose from his chair in front of the fireplace. "Lovely, just lovely. Yes, I have the recipe for my Stone just over here-" he walked over to the mantelpiece and picked up a framed photo; he took out the photo and showed Draco the recipe on the back. It was a messily-written list of ingredients followed by a method; Draco stepped forwards to take a cursory glance over it and Flamel snatched it back. "The Resurrection Stone, please," he said, holding out his hand. Draco went to reach into his pocket and withdraw the Stone when he realised- he didn't have it. Potter did.

He turned back to Potter- still asleep, silent and still. The edges of the Resurrection stone were barely visible in his pocket. Draco could easily take it out and exchange it, but... This was _Potter's_ stone. What if he wanted to use it one last time? Oh, dear Merlin, Draco was going soft.

Nonetheless, he turned back to Flamel and said, "No, thank you, I'll wait for my companion to awaken."

Flamel, looking slightly offended, withdrew his hand. "I see. When he wakes, come back."

Draco headed out, back through the wall, resigning himself to waiting out there until Potter woke up.

He didn't have to wake very long.

Potter- who he'd let down earlier, and had since slept still and rigid- started frowning, mumbling, and twisting in his sleep; then he started kicking and flailing, and his mumbles turned into incoherent shouts; Draco scrambled away so as not to be hit. Potter jerked awake very suddenly, eyes flying open. He looked around wildly for a few moments before he spotted Draco. He squinted and, hesitantly, asked, "Malfoy?" 

"Obviously," Draco drawled. "Who else?"

Potter bristled, on-edge from what Draco deduced had been a nightmare. "Well, I don't have my glasses, and we'd been attacked by bloody werewolves last I remember. Are we still in Flamel's place?"

Draco fished Potter's glasses out of his pocket where he'd kept them while Potter rested, handing them over as he spoke. "Yeah. I couldn't very well leave here with you asleep; you have to be awake to leave."

"Did you give Flamel the stone?" Potter asked, slipping on his glasses.

Draco shifted uncomfortably. "No, I- I didn't know if you were done with it, and I didn't want to give it over without your permission. After all, you have the dead family members, not me."

Potter blinked, then let out a quiet, "Oh." After a moment, he added, "Er- thanks, Malfoy. You didn't have to do that, but- thanks. I did talk to my parents and Sirius and everyone last night, though, but thank you."

Draco looked away. "Least I could do." Then he decided that he had been kind enough to Potter to make up for all his previous years of terribleness and threw up his usual Malfoy aristocratism. "In any case, now you're awake, let's go trade the Stone."

Flamel was still sat before the fireplace. When Draco walked in, he stood, picking up the photo and recipe. "Ready to exchange, now, boy?"

"Yeah," Potter replied, holding out the stone for Flamel. Flamel went to inspect it and Potter snatched it back, the same way Flamel had with the Philosopher's stone earlier. "The recipe?"

"Right here," Flamel said irritably. 

Potter stepped forwards, holding the stone in one hand, the other open for the recipe. Flamel passed the photo, eyes fixed on the Resurrection stone. He took it from Potter's hand almost gingerly. "Alright," he said. "That's everything. Go on, now, off you go."

Potter turned, holding the recipe, and walked out the door without a backwards glance.

"Right. Thank you, Mr. Flamel," Draco said, but Flamel just waved him off.

The boys only walked a few steps outside the house before they returned to the real world in a beam of white light. Draco didn't quite know how it worked; he just willed to return home and he disappeared, Potter beside him.


	10. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, the Disappearance and the Arrangement

Harry Potter didn't care for Draco Malfoy. Not one bit. Sure, he'd spent so long watching Malfoy and trying to understand what he was thinking and feeling that he was able to read Malfoy better than most people could ever hope to, and _maybe_ he felt a little warmth towards him when he did something like waiting for Harry to be ready before trading away the Resurrection Stone, and yes, he was interested in the Dreamless Sleep potion Malfoy was making, but that was only because Harry suffered from nightmares and wanted them to go away as soon as possible, nothing more.

He had to say this often to Hermione; she seemed unable to accept. and always gave him a Look. Well, whether she liked it or not, it was true; Hermione could take her knowing looks somewhere else.

Having spent the past seven years watching Malfoy's actions closely, analysing his every move, Harry was slightly concerned when Malfoy didn't show up to breakfast the day after he and Harry had retrieved the recipe for the Philosopher's Stone; when he brought it up to Hermione, however, she gave him that knowing Look again and said, "Harry, the war is over. He's not up to anything," and Harry nearly said, _I don't suspect him of anything, I'm worried about him_ , until he realised that oh, _Merlin_ , he was _worried_ for the ferret-faced git. He determined not to even think about Malfoy the rest of the day. Despite this, he still noticed that Malfoy wasn't in classes, and he continued to reassured himself with the conclusion that Malfoy was just skipping or something.

After a week, Malfoy still hadn't shown up for any classes or mealtimes, and Harry was starting to worry. Malfoy wouldn't skip a whole week of school willingly, even if he was sick. After all, when Malfoy _was_ sick (which was a rare occurrence in itself), he would be so worried about the lessons he was missing he'd return before he was even healed enough to. For something to keep him from school for a week, it had to be pretty serious. 

Harry's suspicions were confirmed when, on Friday, he overheard Parkinson and Zabini talking in quiet voices in the hallway about how _Draco hasn't even left his room, is he alright_? and _I_ _don't_ _know, Pans, he's always in bed after me and up before the sun_ , and _Well_ , _is he even eating?_ and _Probably not. Pans, you know how he gets when he's doing something like this, he doesn't even remember to eat. I'm not sure he's even sleeping._

When Harry heard this, he immediately decided he would go and check on Malfoy; after all, the last time he'd avoided his friends like this, he'd been working on getting Death Eaters into Hogwarts. Yes, he'd go make sure Malfoy wasn't planning a Vanishing Cupboard act that would end in someone dying again, that was it. What Harry was _not_ doing was going to check on Malfoy because he was concerned for his health. No, Harry would _never_ be concerned for the git's health. (In his head, Hermione was giving him the Look again. Well, she could shut up, 'cause she was wrong.)

He absolutely didn't know what Malfoy's eating habits were, and he definitely didn't steal a green apple- specifically green- from the kitchens to take down to Malfoy because it was the _one_ _thing_ Malfoy would be sure to eat- no, that was _ridiculous_ , because Harry hadn't even once paid attention to what kind of apple Malfoy preferred. Yes, ridiculous.

"Hey, Malfoy, you want this apple? It's green," Harry said, entering the potions classroom Snape used to basically inhabit. He watched as Malfoy's head perked up at the mention of a green apple, and tossed the apple he was holding at Malfoy, trusting that Malfoy's Seeker reflexes would kick in. They did, and Malfoy caught the apple easily, taking a bite immediately.

A blissful smile crossed his face for a moment, and he said, "Thank you, Potter." Then he whirled, almost choking on his apple, and repeated, " _Potter_?!" incredulously.

"Yes, Malfoy. Hello. You know, you're worrying your friends, being down here all the time. Personally, I was worried you were turning into Snape," Harry replied. He consciously avoided thinking about the fact that he was worried about Malfoy's wellbeing and- what? No, he wasn't, where did that thought come from?

Malfoy turned back to his work. "I'm insulted, Potter. Do you really think I'd let my hair get into such a greasy state?"

Harry snorted. "I suppose not, posh git that you are. What are you doing down here?"

"What do you think, Potter? I'm growing the things I need for the Philosopher's stone. What else would I be doing?"

"I don't know. How's it going with growing stuff? Killed anything?"

"No, Potter, I am actually quite capable of keeping things alive; I, myself, am a prime example. I am incredibly difficult to keep alive, you know, and yet here I stand, perfectly healthy. These plants are all perfectly healthy, and they should be ready to add to the potion that'll make the Stone soon."

"Right. Oh, by the way, how come you're down here and not in classes?"

Malfoy raised an eyebrow. "You're not in classes, either, Potter."

"Well- I'm down here, checking on you. You're growing plants. They can't need _constant_ supervision, can they?"

In response, Malfoy stepped back from the table of plants; immediately, half of them began crying, a quarter started full-on screaming and lashing out with their leaves, and only the remaining quarter remained docile- _as_ _plants_ _should_ _be_. Harry slammed his hands over his ears and shouted for Malfoy to make it stop. Malfoy stepped forwards, next to the table, again, and the noise and thrashing immediately stopped.

"I stand corrected," Harry mumbled, rubbing his ears and glaring at the plants.

Malfoy smirked. "Yes. So, McGonagall gave me leave to attend the plants instead of attending lessons."

Harry scowled. _He_ wanted to miss lessons. Then an idea crossed his mind. "Say, Malfoy," he began.

Immediately, Malfoy's guards went up; he visibly became more wary. "What, Potter?"

"Well- do you eat?"

"No, I starve. Yes, Potter, I eat."

"Right. Do you sleep?"

Malfoy hesitated before answering this time. "Yeah, I do..."

"How much?"

"...Not much."

Harry grinned victoriously. "Right. I have an idea. So, you don't like missing classes, do you?"

"No, I don't. Having people bring me their notes isn't anywhere _near_ good enough."

"Oh, ask Hermione. She'll lend you hers, and she writes about as much as you do."

"She does? Oh, that's brilliant- wait, how do you know how much I write?"

Harry skipped over that. "Well, you don't like missing lessons. And I _do_ like missing lessons. Especially the boring ones. And you _love_ the boring ones."

"...Right. And where are you going with this?"

"So, I'm not brilliant at potions or herbology-"

"Yes, I know, I've been in your class for _seven_ _years_ , Potter."

"But I can follow instructions. So, I could look after the plants for, say, half the time, so you could sleep and attend some lessons and socialise and eat and you could spend the other half down here looking after them?"

Malfoy's eyes narrowed. "What's the catch? How do you benefit from this?"

"Well, aside from the potion itself, I get to miss some classes."

"...Right. And how do I know that you won't kill my plants? Even accidentally?"

Hm. That was a little trickier. "Well, what if you observed me for a couple days? Or even a week or so? Just until you know I can be trusted. Or, er, maybe till they stop screaming so much."

Malfoy frowned. It was a good offer, Harry knew; he hadn't been offered Slytherin for nothing. And Malfoy was visibly exhausted... 

"Alright, Potter," he said at last. "It's a deal."


	11. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, Parenting, Viv and Occlumency: Attempt 2

Draco decided that he'd spend a week supervising Potter and accustomising him to the plants, and if, after the week was up, Potter appeared competent enough to not kill his plants when he wasn't there, he would comply with Potter's idea of splitting the care of the plants. McGonagall gave her permission after a glance at Draco's tired eyes and demeanor, and it was settled.

Potter, it turned out, was surprisingly competent at looking after things.

Perhaps it was his heroic streak that refused to allow anything to die, but he seemed to almost intuitively know what the plants needed and when; a few days into the supervision, Draco actually left the plants with Potter to go and eat lunch with his friends. When he returned, the plants were quiet, and Potter was sat in- was that a _rocking_ _chair_?- holding a plant pot like a baby. Draco recognised the plant as the _Vivere_ _Planta_ _Amoris_ ; the most high-maintenance plant he had, and the most likely to cause a problem, especially with Draco away. While most of his other sentient plants had taken to Potter after a day or so, the _Vivere_ _Planta_ _Amoris_ had stubbornly refused his care, always wanting for Draco instead. 

Potter looked up from where he was rocking the plant, and, seeing the look on Draco's face, said, "Don't. I didn't know how to keep her quiet, and she reminded me of a baby, and, well, this is a popular Muggle method for calming babies. Hey, it worked. I think she's asleep now, though, and my legs are falling asleep. Could you- help?"

Draco cocked his head to the side and smirked. "Hm, no, I don't think I will. Oh, Potter, by the way- she?"

Potter blushed. "Yeah, well, I- she seems like a she."

Draco's smirk widened. "Don't tell me you've named her, too."

Potter's blush deepened, and Draco raised an incredulous eyebrow- and started laughing.

"At least tell me you named her something _good_."

"Er... Viv, short for Vivian."

Draco looked at him in astonishment. "Only you, Potter," he exclaimed. "Only _you_ would name a plant and- and rock it to _sleep_! Wait- Potter. Don't tell me." Draco had spotted something at the foot of the chair; his gaze fixated on it, and Potter's drifted down to see where he was looking. Potter groaned. "Potter! Oh my _Merlin_ , were you reading my plant- _bedtime_ _stories_?" 

"She wouldn't stop crying for you!"

Draco laughed harder, doubling over and wheezing.

"Gentlemen?" asked a voice behind him. Draco spun around, attempting to quench his laughter (and failing, quite badly) to see McGonagall, one eyebrow arched inquisitively, looking on at the scene; Potter, sat in a rocking chair, holding a potted plant, Draco, laughing, a pile of children's books on the floor. 

"I came to come and see how you were doing and make sure neither of you were dead, but... I believe I should be more concerned that neither of you are, nor any of your plants."

Potter started defending himself from the suspicions clearly forming on McGonagall's face; she'd seen Draco in the Great Hall for lunch, and was absolutely observant enough to figure out what had happened.

"Mr. Potter," she said, and Potter groaned again, hanging his head in defeat, "Have you- _adopted_ this plant?"

Potter didn't even try to deny it. Draco started laughing again. McGonagall turned on him.

"Mr. Malfoy, you have been caring for these plants for over a week now, staying up at night for them and everything, I believe, quite akin to how a parent would."

Now Draco flushed, stuttering out excuses and denials. At that moment, Viv started wailing, apparently woken from her nap by the clamour the three were making. Almost instinctively, Draco strode over to Potter, who handed over the plant carefully. This had happened multiple times, and the two had slowly developed a routine. When Viv had calmed down, a snort reminded the boys remembered they weren't alone. 

McGonagall was laughing. 

Full-on chortling.

"Never thought I'd see the day," she gasped. "You- you two- you look like _parents_! Like two parents looking after their child! Oh, this is brilliant. Pomona, Albus and Severus all owe me twenty galleons each!" She declared, leaving the room still laughing, unaware of the two mortified boys she'd left behind.

Draco turned, very slowly to face Potter, McGonagall's words ringing in his head. Look like parents. _Parents_. And he realised, with a shock, that they were. Potter seemed to realise this, too, because he turned and met Draco's mortified gaze with one of his own. "Dear Merlin," Draco breathed. "What's happened to me?"

"Me, too," Potter murmured. "I hate you, Malfoy," he said, but it seemed like he was trying to convince himself; none of his usual vigor or passion was really there. When he realised this, his face drained of colour.

"Potter," Draco spat, the way he always did; but it was lacking in its hatred, its disgust. It sounded half-hearted, and- forced. 

"Oh my _Merlin_ ," the boys said together as realisation flashed through their eyes. Horror followed immediately, for both had read the realisation written across the other's face as they came to a conclusion themself.

The words were left unspoken, but they hung heavy in the air: _I don't actually hate you._

The next day, Potter arrived before Draco did; when Draco found him, Potter insisted Draco go to classes and catch up with friends, saying he was good enough to look after the plants. Draco hesitated, but the lure of company other than Potter's and plants was irresistible. He left with a quiet "Thank you," and went to join his friends for breakfast.

Upon arrival in the Great Hall, he was ambushed. 

Two ginger-haired menaces flew at him, both talking over each other, shouting questions and accusations at Draco. Behind them, Granger watched on in amusement. Pansy and Blaise, who had been sat next to her (since when did that happen?) stood and joined her, smirking. This wouldn't be good.

"Malfoy, what have you done with Harry?" demanded Weasel- Weasley- one. His voice was full of hatred and disdain for Draco, and it made him realise just how pathetically lacking in malice Potter's voice had been yesterday. 

The smaller Weaslette asked, "Where is he?"

"Yeah, Malfoy. He got up at three in the morning- maybe earlier- from a nightmare, and left bed immediately. Didn't even _try_ to fall back to sleep. Didn't come back to bed, either. I checked the Map this morning and it said he was in Snape's old classroom, which could only be _your_ fault, it's where you've been keeping him these last few days, what have you done to him? He can throw off Imperius, it couldn't be torture-" his eyes narrowed- "Could it?"

Granger stepped forward, finally, and pulled back Weasley. The Weaslette had been detained by Lovegood, and was now eyeing Draco dangerously from the Gryffindor table, where Pansy and Blaise had seated themselves to wait for Draco to defuse the threats.

Draco decided he'd deal with the immediate threat first.

"Weasley, I haven't done anything. Potter's probably rocking plants to sleep as we speak and reading them stories. He's fine. Go check on him if you want; you know where he is. He offered, himself, to take care of my plants I need for my project so I could sleep and eat and all that other mundane stuff necessary for living. Terribly inconvenient, but we all need to do it. In any case, he's fine. Say, Granger, how are you?" he added. 

"What do you want, Malfoy?" she asked; but she wasn't just asking like normal people did. She knew that he wanted something specific. Clever.

"Well, Potter told me that you take good notes, and we have all the same classes, so..."

"And why should I let you borrow my notes?"

Draco pulled his Hail Mary. "Granger, don't you remember what I'm making?"

She hesitated, then sighed. "Oh, alright. But you can't keep them, only copy them out. Alright?"

Draco smiled. "Alright."

He sat with Pansy and Blaise at the Gryffindor Table. "What are you doing here?" he asked them.

Pansy gave Blaise a triumphant look. "Pay up, darling, pay up." As Blaise reluctantly gave her a few galleons, she said, "Honestly, Draco, you disappear for a week, then you steal Potter from the Gryffindors, and you don't even say hello?"

"I didn't steal him-"

"But to answer your question: Blaise and I found that the Slytherin gossip is all rather old, the usual scandals and such repeating themselves. Meanwhile, over here, we can _create_ gossip by socialising with lions, and we can also get on McGonagall's good side about all that inter-house friendship stuff. Besides, it's boring without you, and the Golden Trio were missing their dear Potter while we mourned our loss of you. So we grouped together."

"Right... So you joined the Gryffindors because you missed me and they missed Potter?"

"Pretty much," Blaise said.

Just then, a wail echoed from the corridor and the doors to the Great Hall slammed open; in strode Potter, attracting the attention of every eye in the Hall. He paused for a moment, oblivious to the attention on him, and scanned the hall. When he spotted Draco, he immediately headed towards him. He looked distraught.

He didn't say a word, only handed Viv to Draco with an easy, fluid motion. A ripple of gasps echoed across the hall at this simple, friendly- paternal, even- motion. Draco stood abruptly, bid Pansy and Blaise goodbye, and hurried out of the hall, rocking and comforting Viv, Potter hot on his heels.

Viv still hadn't calmed down by the time Draco and Potter had reached the Potions room. It took half an hour of both boys fussing over her to get her to calm down. When she finally stopped crying, Potter sank down into the rocking chair, looking utterly exhausted. Draco remembered what Weasley had said earlier.

"How long did you sleep, Potter?"

"A couple hours."

"Weasley said you woke up from a nightmare."

"Yeah, I did. Really early in the morning. I knew I wouldn't be getting back to sleep, so I came down here early."

"Huh. Say, Potter, do you know what Occlumency is?"

Potter scowled. "Yeah, I do, but Snape tried to teach me in Fifth year, and he did such a terrible job that my Godfather ended up dead."

"Right. I think even I could teach you better than that; the bar's pretty low. And now there's no stress of anyone dying, it's just to stop nightmares until the potion's ready."

Potter hesitated. "Ask your question, Potter," Draco said.

"Well- er- it's just- what is Occlumency?"

Draco stared at Potter. "How- did Severus not teach you the basics?"

"The first thing he did was perform Legilimency on me and told me to break out of it."

"Oh, Merlin. He _did_ hate you, didn't he? If you managed that even once with that little instruction... Okay. Let's start from the basics.

"Occlumency is the act- or the ability- of having complete control over your emotions and your mind, as a general definition. You can use it to repel Legilimens and other mind-infiltrating powers; others might use it as a method of meditation or to control anger or fear or sadness.

"I'm going to teach you the more meditational way of using Occlumency. It's far easier than learning to defend against Legilimency, and you should only need to learn this to stave off nightmares. Also, you can use this knowledge and apply it to stronger forms of Occlumency; and should you ever need to use Legilimens on an Occlumens, you would, theoretically, know the weaknesses of Occlumency to exploit them.

"Let's start with more traditional meditation methods to try and get you to understand what sort of thing we're hoping to achieve with Occlumency. This will also help you with identifying and ignoring emotions you don't want to remain calm, which can be incredibly useful in many situations in the Wizarding world." Draco tried to recall how Severus had done this for him; he made his voice low and quiet, as soothing as he could make it. Soft, almost, except Malfoy's don't do soft. 

"Lie down, and close your eyes." Potter obeyed. "Good. Now, you can cast a Patronus. You know the process of casting one. Think of your happiest memory. Visualise it now. Picture it as well as you can. Were the people there? Who? Were they smiling? Do they have freckles? What colour are their eyes? Where are you? What's the weather like?" Each question Draco asked brought forth an element of the memory; as he prompted more details from Potter, Potter began to smile. Good. 

"Keep that in mind. I'm going to walk you through some breathing techniques. Keep your eyes closed, and remember that happy memory.

"Breathe in for a count of four- one, two, three, four; now hold your breath for a count of seven- one, two, three, four, five six, seven. Now out for eight- one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight." Draco was careful to keep his voice slow and steady, counting a beat for Potter. "Good. Do that twice more, thinking of your happy memory as you do." This breathing pattern released calming chemicals in the brain; it showed Potter what sort of emotion he would be hoping to provoke with Occlumency. Thinking of his happy memory as he did would hopefully associate the memory with the breathing exercise, and therefore the emotion the memory provoked as a result. 

"Now, think of your unhappiest memory. That could be something to do with Voldemort, or your nightmares; it could be sad, or angry. Imagine it in as much detail as you can, even if it hurts. This has to be your _worst_ memory. 

"Now, try the breathing pattern from earlier. Remember your happy memory. I'll count. One, two, three, four. One, two, three four, five, six, seven. One, two, three, four, five six, seven, eight. Very good.

"Okay, you're doing brilliantly. How do you feel?"

"Really good," Potter said. His voice was quiet; almost subdued. "Calm, and happy, too."

Draco smiled. It was working! "Alright, I've got some work for you. Every night, before you go to bed, try this exercise to calm you down. When you're doing the breathing exercise, think of your happy memory. If you wake up from a nightmare, try this, too; it might help you get back to sleep."

"Thank you," Potter said quietly.

"You're welcome," Draco replied.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The breathing technique Draco uses actually works; some sciencey stuff makes it release calming chemicals from the brain. It's good to help calm yourself down; just repeat the exercise a few times over if you're stressed.


	12. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, Childhood Memories, Rooms of Requirement, and Loci

Once Draco had returned to his dormitory, having successfully taught Potter how to calm his mind, he started thinking. 

As Pansy would say, this couldn't go anywhere good.

Draco appeared to be an adequate teacher, and calming enough to successfully get even the constantly panicked Potter to learn a few breathing techniques. So, he'd succeeded.

Draco liked succeeding.

Could he succeed even more?

His Slytherin ambition would kill him someday.

Draco didn't sleep that night; he spent the whole time reading and practicing, wandering around the Slytherin dormitories and Common rooms; then he slowly expanded his trail outwards a few corridors and classrooms.

He gained many strange looks from classmates, up late from nightmares, portraits and ghosts; to escape them, and to clear his head as the sun rose over Hogwarts' great turrets, he strode down to the Black Lake. 

He made his way down the shore leisurely, calm and level-headed after all the meditative exercises he'd done. His head did hurt a little- he'd forced a lot of information into it in a very short amount of time- but he was glad he'd found a personal use for this technique other than meditation. 

He skipped breakfast in the Great Hall purposefully that morning, walking his friends to the doors and bidding them goodbye just as they entered. He stepped far enough in to be seen, then turned around and made his way down to the dungeons. Straining his ears, he could only just hear the telltale scuffle of Potter grabbing up all his things and racing after Draco, and the resulting shouts of his friends after him. Indeed, after a little, Potter caught up to him in the hallways. His breathing was far too even after he'd run all that way; he was probably trying to consciously slow his breathing so as to appear more composed. The fool. Draco knew all those tricks. After all, he'd used them all multiple times over the past few years. 

"So, Malfoy," Potter said. Ooh, conversation without any "er"'s or "um"'s. Perhaps Potter was finally becoming adequate at social interaction!

"Why- er-" Or perhaps not. "I was wondering why you weren't in the Great Hall for breakfast- it's my turn to look after Viv and the others today, right?"

Draco waved him off. "I put up spells around them to monitor them, and they've all been moved to our new location."

Potter immediately turned wary. "New location?"

"Yeah, I figured that the potions room we were using was far too open, so I asked McGonagall and all of the plants have been moved. We- well, I- also have better, newer equipment in the new location."

"Where?"

"Room of Requirement." The idea had come to Draco last night as he's been wandering the shores of the Lake, pondering what he knew about the Stone, and he'd remembered when Potter had taken him to the Room, and changed it to how he needed it to be. Draco had moved all the plants himself, before he returned to bed- and he hadn't asked McGonagall, but he hadn't told her where he was brewing potions and growing plants before and she'd found him. 

Potter had said "Oh," quietly; now he strode confidently ahead of Draco, knowing where they were headed.

Choosing the Room as the new location had been difficult and yet easy; the idea, when it came upon him, immediately struck him as obvious and safe and easy. Choosing to willingly face what had happened there before had not been. But he ended up avoiding all of the trauma linked to this room, caught up in the places he ended up creating.

Draco paced in front of the wall, brow furrowed, concentrating on the room he'd settled upon last night. When he looked up, there it was; the large oak door that opened silently, revealing his dream room.

His plants were all in little cute plant pots of varying shades of green and turquoise, hung from little metal hooks in the ceiling on the left of the vast room. The middle was taken up mostly by rows upon rows of desks and equipment; everything Draco had ever dreamed of. To the right of the room was an incredibly large potions cabinet, full of hundreds- if not thousands- of ingredients and simple base potions. 

At the back of the room was a door. This had taken Draco a good half hour of trial and error to get right, plus the hours spent examining the source material. He led an ogling Potter past all the alchemy and potions equipment to the door, and opened it to let Potter through first. Potter stopped stock-still in the doorway, and Draco knew his jaw had dropped open, his eyes wide with wonder.

Last night, Draco had walked down by the Black Lake- and further, out of the grounds of Hogwarts. There, he'd apparated to a quiet little village called Godric's Hollow.

He'd spent a good while looking around, noting the architecture and colour scheme, until he came to what was clearly the Potter's old house. 

It was far more run-down than the rest, but most of it was recognisable. Draco had learned the layout, all of the little things like the genres of books on the bookshelves, the main items in each room, even the organisation method of the cupboards. He'd memorised the smell of the home, the softness of the carpets, the amount of stairs.

And he'd recreated it all here, in the Room of Requirement.

Evidently Potter had been to see his home; he recognised the place immediately. He walked hesitantly into the room, brushing his fingers lightly over the furniture and the books. He wandered into the kitchen, out of Draco's sight, and Draco heard the creak of a cupboard being opened, followed by Potter's soft gasp. Potter emerged a few minutes later, and Draco pretended he didn't see the tears glistening on Potter's cheeks. 

Potter made his way upstairs slowly, and Draco seated himself on the living room sofa, listening to the creak of the floorboards upstairs. All the doors in the hallway at the top of the stairs were opened and shut individually; every room was given a few minutes of appreciation.

Draco leant back and listened to Potter rediscovering his childhood home when his eyes caught on the one thing he'd changed. 

The stairs.

Everyone had heard about how Potter had lived as a child, before he came to Hogwarts. It'd been a scandal, pretty much, when it came out; the papers were all over the fact that muggles had mistreated _the_ Harry Potter. It had turned out that the Potters had a cupboard under the stairs, too; and while theirs had been full of canned provisions- likely in case they'd needed to fully shut down to hide from Voldemort- Draco hadn't felt right leaving it in this remodelled home, a visual reminder of Potter's childhood abuse. Especially not with what Draco had designed this place for.

"Hey, Malfoy?" Potter called from upstairs. 

"Yeah?"

Potter emerged from the tops of the stairs, holding a weathered piece of parchment that Draco had hoped he'd find. "How'd you get this?"

In his hand was a little photograph, a few-seconds-long loop, taken by Bathilda Bagshot on the day of Harry Potter's first birthday. In it, a little boy rode a tiny broomstick around the house, chased by his father, while his mother sat by, laughing.

"Found a scrap of parchment, and tried a _Reparo_ on it to see what it was. Turned into that. I left a copy of it back at Godric's Hollow, but I thought you should have the real thing."

Potter turned away abruptly. When he spoke, his voice sounded a little thick. "Oh, well-" he cleared his throat- "Thank you. It- er, I don't have much like this that I can- can openly display. So, er, thank you."

"You're welcome, Potter."

"Say, why are you being so- I mean, this must've taken ages. It's accurate to my real home, as far as I can tell. Just- um- why?"

"So, you remember that breathing exercise I taught you yesterday?"

"Oh, yeah- I used it last night, actually. I only had one nightmare, and I actually managed to sleep afterwards. Thanks."

"You're welcome. In any case, I learned- I mean, I remembered a new method to calm yourself. It's also a way of remembering things pretty well. And it's why I brought you-" he gestured to the home around him- "This. 

"It's called the Method of Loci. There are many ways it is learned and utilised; I'm going to teach you the way I learned it," _Literally just last night, just for this, just for you_ , he added mentally, "And how it can help you.

"So, the theory is, you create a space in your head that you can store bits of information in, through writing or images and sounds; I've heard it be called a mind palace, if that's how you want to think about it. I'm going to help you make a mind palace of your own, and then you can use it however you wish. You can add people you know, you can add plants; I'm teaching you because it's a place you can go to in your mind where no one else can get in. It's sort of a non-magical form of Occlumency, I suppose.

"So, you take a place that you know well. You're going to use this house. You start with one room of the house. We're starting here. Now, go stand in the doorway." When Potter had moved, Draco continued. "Walk around the room, starting on your left and making your way around clockwise back to the doorway." When he had finished, Draco said, "Good. Go again.

"This time round, pick five large, noticeable objects in the room. Make them as unique to this one room as possible. So the sofa here, which isn't in any other room, is a good choice. Touch your objects as you go past them. Done?" Potter nodded. "Right. Now, come sit here," Draco said, shuffling over so Potter could sit on the sofa with him, "And imagine this room. The walls, the boundaries; don't go any further. Just this one room. 

"Now, take your five objects. In your mind, starting at the doorway, make your way around the room again; as you do, place your five things. Go around the room again. Make sure you know those objects, and where they are. Always walk the same path past them to remember them best.

"Right, you're doing well. Now, go and do the same for all the other rooms. Five large, unique items and the room they're in. Travel the path of this room into the next, and once you've done a room, return to here with your first five objects and make sure you remember them all, and then go through your house in your mind again, always walking the same path. I'll just be in the other room if you need me."

Potter set off, headed for the kitchens, and Draco retreated to the potions room, where Viv had started crying. As he hushed her, he heard a cry from the House (as he had dubbed the adjoining space). Potter stumbled out of the room a little later, holding a trunk. Oh, so he'd found that, too. Good. It'd taken Draco a while to find it, and it'd been a pain to haul it from the outskirts of Hogwarts to the Room of Requirement, but Potter was very clearly happy with it. He hugged it tight, held Draco's eyes confidently, even as his voice broke as he told him, almost reverently, "Thank you."

The label on the trunk, though faded and worn, read: Lily Evans.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Method of Loci is also another thing you can try out. There are loads of videos about it online if you'd like to try.


	13. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, Sixth Year and the Grim Old Place

Draco let Potter take a day to familiarise and memorise his childhood home, storing each room in his mind palace, each room having the five main objects within it. Draco took this time to tend to his plants and to the base potion that would, hopefully, produce the Philosopher's stone. 

The ingredients had been difficult to obtain (as was shown by the fact that he was growing the plants himself), but the brewing of the potion itself was almost impossible. First of all, it was written in a shorthand Draco could hardly read, so he'd had to transcribe it; secondly, he'd had to find rare varieties of stirring sticks and cauldron materials in order to be able to brew the cauldron with as few lethal reactions as possible. He'd avoided any so far, but the most dangerous part was when he added one of Viv's leaves, ground up into a mush, mixed with a drop of his own blood- _red blood, pure and young; tainted, as all humans are_ , the instructions had read. The blood, if not matching the instructions, could very easily explode and ruin all attempts of the potion.

Potter still brought him food; he'd been sneaking food in from the kitchens (he'd tried asking the Room for some, but it just didn't taste quite as good) and had taken to cooking up lunch for Draco and himself. It forced Draco to take a (well-needed) break from his potions and plants, and it allowed Potter a break from his memorising of his house.

When he had finished with the physical layout of his house and was able to recall every room and the items within it as quickly as Draco could think of them, Draco deemed him able to move on.

"The next step is to start adding people, for your purposes, I think," Draco told him. "You want to relax, right? Have a place you can get away to? Well, wouldn't you like your friends there? And you could add dead people- like Diggory, or Lupin, or that godfather of yours. If you know them well enough, you can add them. You could even add your parents."

Potter's eyes had widened, and his lips had parted. "How?"

"You know how you put all the items in your rooms?" Draco asked. 

Potter nodded.

"Well, do that but with people. Get out of the Room of Requirement, get back into Hogwarts; start going to lessons and all again. But pay attention to your friends. To anyone you want to put into your house, really. Memorise them. Little things they do when they're bored, how they fiddle, what they like to eat, their speech patterns; memorise them."

"Oh, um, okay. But- er, I mean- how- what do you mean?"

Could Draco have said it better? Gryffindors, honestly. Draco sighed. "Alright, Potter. You blink when you're confused. You get quiet after a nightmare. You trace your scars when remembering them or what gave you them. Whenever someone mentions something you don't like, you close off completely- it's actually a little scary. When someone brings up a dead person who fought for you, you turn your head a little to the left, like you're trying to turn away from the conversation. You're almost always looking over your shoulder, and when you go round a blind corner, you hesitate a moment. You stand in your duelling position, with your left foot in front of your right-" and Draco cut himself off there, because he was revealing that he knew far too much about Potter, and _Oh_ , _Merlin_ , _was_ _Pansy_ _right_? 

Thankfully, Potter was oblivious and thought Draco had just been listing off his attributes, not revealing all the things he'd noticed.

"Right, I see. Thanks."

Draco nodded his acknowledgement. "So, once you memorise someone, you pick a room that they'd most likely be found in- so, for your Weasel, probably the kitchen-" Potter made a sound of protest, but Draco smirked and moved on- "And you put them there, in your home in you mind, doing something- always doing something, because you'll remember movement better than most other things. So, put Granger on the sofa, reading, for example, rather than having her stand around doing nothing. Have Luna sitting upside down reading the Quibbler, rather than just pointing at something and smiling. The crazier and more absurd, the better. 

"You have to know the person who you're putting in your mind palace well enough to be able to pretty much know what they'd say to a certain situation. Take the Weasel again. If faced with a group of Acromantulas, he would scream. Don't look at me like that, you know it's true. So you have to be able to predict their actions; when you retreat to your home in your mind, you will go to whoever you need, and they will help you. But you have to think of how they'll help you, because they're in your mind.

"Really, people are supposed to be there to prompt you, to make you think a certain way. So a Hufflepuff might be there to make you think more kindly, a Gryffindor to make you braver. A Ravenclaw to make you smarter, a Slytherin to help you achieve your goals. So, that's your mission for the next-" he glanced at the potion- "two days. After that, I'll need you to supervise me with the potion in case something goes wrong. But till then, off with you. Go learn some people, inside and out."

Potter returned halfway through the second day. 

"Need my help, Potter?" Draco asked as the door to the Room creaked open. 

"Actually, yeah," Potter said. 

"Go on, then."

"Er- can I ask you some questions?"

"You just did."

"Right. Well- er-" And Potter proceeded to ask Draco what felt like a thousand questions, varying in topic and seriousness. Some were about his friends, some for his family; some were what-would-you-do-in-this-situation type questions; some were more personal, more about his thought processes and emotions. Some were about his qualities as a person; how he acted around people, how he talked to get what he wanted. Draco closed off on a couple, but had no problems with the rest, until- "What are your eating habits like?"

Draco had been trimming Viv's twigs back, pampering her leaves and not really paying attention.

"Well, I get hyper-fixated on some things. I'll forget to do everything else, like sleep and eat, because I'm so used to just working on something, and not allowing myself any basic needs until it's done. Guess it's a habit now." Draco didn't see Potter's eyebrows shoot up. "Sticks pretty easily, too. After I first developed it, back in sixth year-" he didn't see the way Potter's body went tense and still- "I couldn't eat much except water on a day-to-day basis, 'cause my body was so used to receiving so few nutrients, getting so many from a full meal made me sick."

"Draco," Potter said, and Draco got a double shock to his system. Firstly, he'd forgotten Potter was there. He would _never_ had said that about himself, revealed such a weakness, if he'd remembered someone was listening. _Stupid_! Second- ' _Draco_ '? What happened to 'Malfoy'?

His head shot up, staring at Potter like a deer caught in headlights. 

"Draco, when was the last time you ate?" His voice was inquisitive, calm- but Draco had analysed Potter's every move for as long as he could remember.

He was unbelievably close to bursting with rage. 

What did he want Draco to say?

"Um-" Wait, actually- when _was_ the last time Draco had eaten? Not today, certainly, and he'd skipped dinner and lunch at the Great Hall; had he even gotten something from the House area of the Room? His brow furrowed as he thought, and when his stomach groaned, Potter stood.

"Draco," he said again, and this time his voice was soft. "When was the last time you ate?"

"Well- probably- when you last made lunch?"

Potter's eyes went dark. Uh oh. They hadn't done that in a while. And last time Draco had seen that look directed at him- oh. Sixth year. Girl's bathroom. 

Taking that into account, it was _entirely_ reasonable that Draco immediately stiffened- Potter flinched back in surprise- and Draco took the moment to bolt out of the Room like a frightened bunny.

He kept running after he was out of the Room- he knew he had a few seconds that Potter would spend standing still, blinking, and he used them well. He sprinted down the corridor, and, remembering Potter's Map, decided that he would leave Hogwarts grounds at once. But where to go? Where would Potter not think to find him? He couldn't go home, couldn't go to anywhere in Hogwarts- where could he go?

Oh- there was an idea. But could Potter get in? No, he couldn't. He wasn't a descendant of the family. He probably didn't even know the pace existed. Yes, Draco could hide there. 

He made his way quickly out of the school grounds, and then Disapparated.

He appeared in a dismal grey street, somewhere in London. The sky was a blanket of grey, and the chill in the air promised a shower of rain soon. Draco shivered- he was only in his school robes- and stepped forward as a house emerged from between two others. His mother had brought him here when he was very little- the House of Black, she'd told him it was. For years he'd thought it was called "Grim Old Place", for while it was majestic in its pure-blooded splendour, it was grim, and old, and grey. It was hidden from the muggles by a Fidelius charm. He wondered who the Secret-Keeper was nowadays.

He stepped inside. He remembered this house; though he'd been young during his first visit, his mother had brought him back here every now and then, showing him her childhood home. 

He walked over to where the family tapestry hung on the wall, a few scorch marks of disappointing children burned off across the fabric. Near the end, he saw his own little portrait.

He turned away.

The place reeked of dust, grime, and mothballs. Draco set about making himself a nice cup of tea to drink while he let his mind wander- avoiding any thought of Potter or sixth year or Voldemort or- well, he thought about where he was. This old, abandoned building in muggle London, once a place of magnificent splendour, now a run-down abode devoid of life.

Number 12, Grimmauld Place.


	14. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, and the Reconciliation

As Draco had thought he would, Harry had taken a few precious moments in the Room to be confused. He stared at the spot Draco had been stood, then turned to look at the door, now closing slowly behind him He heard feet pounding on the stone tiles, heard them echo more and more quietly as they receded. 

Then it hit Harry that Draco was gone, running away from him, and was probably going to keep running until he was far away unless Harry stopped him. So Harry ran.

He sprinted out of the Room and down the hallway, following the faintest echo of the footsteps; followed them until they stopped abruptly. Harry ran harder, bursting out of the main doors and onto the grounds; the sun blinded him for a moment. The fields were clear as far as Harry could see; everyone was in class. He squinted, looking around wildly for a head of white-blond hair, glinting in the afternoon sunlight. He saw nothing. Surely Draco couldn't have gotten away that quickly? Not without Disapparating, and you can't Disapparate on Hogwarts grounds. Harry knew that from the many lectures from Hermione. But he'd never find Draco by himself... 

He sat down on the stone steps, frowning. 

He heard a crinkle of paper.

The Marauders' Map! How could he have forgotten? He pulled it out, unfolding it with an "I Solemnly Swear that I am Up to No Good," scanning the parchment for ' _Draco_ _Malfoy_ ' even as the ink spread, painting the map of Hogwarts he'd pored over for hours at a time, searching for the very name he was looking for now. When the map had fully unfolded, Harry frowned. 

Draco Malfoy wasn't on the map. 

Had he left Hogwarts grounds? No, he wouldn't, it was dangerous outside of Hogwarts. With any magical beasts roaming the countryside, you never knew what you could encounter. He wouldn't leave Hogwarts unless he was really trying to escape. Why had he even run in the first place? Harry had just been asking him questions so he could add Draco to his mind palace (not that he'd told Draco that that was his motivation). He'd asked if Draco had been eating... Harry tried to recall exactly what had happened.

He'd asked Draco whether he'd eaten... Draco had said- hold on, when had he become _Draco_? That didn't matter. Well, Draco- it sounded far too natural in Harry's mind- had told Harry that he hadn't, not since the last time Harry had cooked- and then Harry frowned as he remembered feeling incredibly angry at himself, for not making sure Draco was eating. It was, after all, why he'd been cooking lunch for Draco; he got so caught up in his work, he forgot to eat. So Harry had been angry at himself for forgetting to feed Draco, and then he'd seen something new in Draco's eyes. Just a flicker of an emotion, but- what was it? Wait, it wasn't entirely new. 

With a jolt of realisation- and horror- Harry realised what the look had been. Fear. Fear of Harry. And the last time Harry had seen that fear, directed towards himself- Draco had nearly bled out on the floor of the girls' bathroom. 

Oh, no. 

Harry had messed up.

Well, he was going to fix it.

First things first- where had Draco gone? Where would he have gone? Somewhere away from Harry, somewhere he thought Harry couldn't find him... Somewhere under a Fidelius charm, then? Unplottable, too. Being who he was, he probably wanted comfort... His father was in Azkaban, and his mother was at Malfoy Manor, where Draco would know Harry would go to look. So Harry mentally crossed Malfoy Manor off the list of places Draco could be. 

Still, he wanted comfort. Who would he go to for that? His friends were all here at Hogwarts, and he'd show up on the map if he was here. His family was already out of the picture... Well, most of them. Wasn't Draco related to the Black family? His mother was Sirius' sister, or something... Harry was pretty sure he'd seen Draco on the Black family tree back at Grimmauld Place. So maybe he'd go to a Black? Who was left?

Bellatrix was- well, even Draco wouldn't go to her, if he could. Andromeda was viewed as a blood traitor by the rest of the family... Where else could someone be? Where would a sole survivor of the Black family go to?

Oh, yeah. 

Grimmauld Place. 

The Black family home.

Harry rushed up to McGonagall's office with a brief "Hello," to Dumbledore, Snape, and Fawkes. He grabbed a handful of Floo powder, and called out "Grimmauld Place!" as he stepped into the fire. 

. . .

Draco, meanwhile, was re-discovering Grimmauld Place- tentatively, slowly, being wary of the potentially dark artefacts that were surely scattered around the house. He went through the kitchen first, then the living room, the staircase, the bedrooms at the top. One seemed far too messy to be of the House of Black; it was full of scratch marks like the one that big brute Buckbeak had left on Draco's arm. Then again, Draco discovered a room full of pictures of someone who looked almost identical to Potter, only with brown eyes- James Potter, he supposed- and some others. The name plaque read, " _Sirius_ _Black_ ". From what Draco could recall, he'd been somewhat of a disgrace; a male heir, sorted into Gryffindor, befriending blood traitors and muggleborns... Draco supposed this room was his personal rebellion to the Black name, in the family's own house. 

His brother, however, had been hailed among the children of Walburga. _Regulus_ _Black_. He'd joined Voldemort incredibly young, and died young, too. Draco passed his room quickly. 

Draco encountered an incredibly large library, too; when he tried to take a heavy tome from the shelf, though, another- even larger one- fell off the shelf, slamming into the floor. 

From below him began an unbearable screeching.

"Intruders!" it screamed. "Intruders in the noble house of Black!"

Draco made his way downstairs cautiously.` On the wall of the entryway hall, a large blanket had been thrown off to reveal a portrait- the source of the screeching. The label read _Walburga_ _Black_. She looked up, spotted Draco, and promptly stopped screaming.

"Oh, Draco dear. I haven't seen you in such a long time. How have you been? How's my Cissy?"

"We're both well, thank you. Yourself?"

She glowered. "I am glad to hear you are well, but I, myself, am struggling. Not only have I and this house been abandoned- we have been taken up by- by mudbloods and blood-traitors and- even worse- Gryffindors. How could this have happened? Draco, why did you and your mother let this happen? That traitor of a son- Sirius-" She spat his name out like it was poisonous- "Has entirely disregarded his heritage, his family- me! And then that godson of his, the Potter boy-" Draco stiffened. Potter? _Godson_ of Sirius Black?- "He just comes strolling in," Potter had been in Grimmauld Place?! "Ruining our home, bewitching poor Regulus' house elf, continuing to let our home fall into ruin- disgraceful, honestly! Draco, dear, you're in his year, aren't you? Could you possibly hurt him- or just immobilise him? Just a little? Just a- _Holy_ _Salazar_! Draco! _Draco_!" She screeched, pointing behind Draco. 

Draco turned around.

Holy Salazar indeed.

There stood Potter, ashes in his hair, eyes bright and defiant. 


	15. Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter are Safe

Draco took a moment to vehemently curse whoever had put up the anti-apparition wards around Grimmauld Place. He couldn't escape this.

Potter looked at the portrait in disgust. He waved his wand and the blanket that had been covering it before flew up to conceal it once more. 

He seemed to know that Draco couldn't escape, too. He started off towards the living room- where he had presumably stepped out of the fireplace- beckoning for Draco to follow him.

Seeing he had no choice, Draco did.

In the living room, Potter had lit the fireplace, and was carelessly brushing away the ashes he must've brought in. Draco settled himself against the wall; stood, and close to the door, so he could escape if things got nasty. He suspected that they would; he was pretty sure, seeing the look on Potter's face, that he knew what they were going to talk about.

As Potter settled away from the fire on the floor next to a seat, he gestured for Draco to join him. Draco did, after a moment of deliberation; only he sat next to the fire and floo powder. Just in case. He realised, very quickly, how hot he would get in his robes, sat in such close proximity to the blazing fire. He shrugged off his robes, and, after a moment, his jumper. As he did this, his white school shirt (silk, obviously) slipped up; he knew this from Potter's sharp inhale.

He'd seen the Sectumsempra scars.

Well, they'd been going to talk about this anyway. Still- the tension in the air was palpable. Potter was staring, mortified, at Draco's chest, where the rest of the scars lay hidden by his shirt. 

"Oh Merlin," Potter breathed. Draco looked away.

Then Potter stood. 

Draco's head shot to him, his body tensing instantaneously, his hand already beginning to reach for the floo powder. He saw the look of hurt in Potter's eyes, the way his posture sagged and his movements halted entirely, and slowly let himself relax and look away again. He was safe. He was safe. He was safe.

"May I?" Potter said- whispered. This seemed too delicate to talk about normally. It had to be treated gently. Potter gestured to Draco's shirt. He wanted to see all the scars. 

Draco's breath caught in his throat, but he slowly undid his buttons with shaking hands. He shrugged off the silk, letting it crumple in a pile on the floor. He still wasn't looking back at Potter. It was fine. He was safe.

Potter sank to his knees before him. "Oh," he breathed. "Oh, Merlin." Draco could practically feel his eyes roaming the scarred expanse of Draco's chest. The skin itself was smoothed, physically indistinguishable from any other part of him; the Dittany did that. But it wasn't quite strong enough to stop the visual scarring- or the emotional scarring, or mental. Visually, there were cuts- thirty-seven on his front, to be precise- lacing his skin with imperfections. The worst was one that stretched from his right shoulder down over the left side of his ribcage, and halfway round his back. It was crisscrossed with many others. 

"Turn around?" Potter asked. 

His back wasn't quite as bad as his front, but he still heard Potter make a soft noise of wounded astonishment as he turned. There were an additional thirteen scars there (to make a total of fifty), mostly on his left side, where the curse had hit hardest. Draco had found it easiest to deal with the incident by facing it analytically; he counted his scars, estimated their depth and how much blood he lost, estimated how long it would've taken to heal without magic (he would've died of blood loss first), etcetera. He felt that by detaching himself emotionally from the incident, he distanced himself mentally from it, too. 

Potter was still examining him. When he returned to Draco's front, he murmured, "I'm so sorry." _Apologies won't fix what you did,_ Draco thought. Potter knew this, though. He bowed his head, looking ashamed and sorrowful and remorseful. "I'm sorry," he said again. Then, after a moment, he said, "I'm so sorry. For everything." Oh. So this was happening _now_ , then. Draco schooled his face into the indifferent Malfoy Mask he had perfected over the years. He feared what his face would show if he didn't.

"I'm- I'm sorry for the insults, for the judgement, for never giving you a second chance, for the War, and for Voldemort; I'm sorry for never trying to help you, never trying to get you out, for abandoning you, and I'm sorry for the jests and the fights and the curses and for judging you from the _very_ _first_ _time_ we met, when I didn't even _know_ about magic and wizards much at all. I'm sorry for everyone who died-" Draco's mask dropped, because this was completely absurd; how were _any_ of the deaths Potter's fault? Except, well, Voldemort, and maybe, possibly- "I'm sorry for Crabbe, and all the other Slytherins, and I'm sorry for what happened to you, I'm sorry for the scars, and for your parents- and- and- and for Dumbledore and Snape, and what you had to do, and for stalking you all of sixth year and never, _ever_ trusting you and for the _Sectum-_ the- the- and I'm sorry for being _me_ , and for not just- not just _dying_ when I was _supposed_ to-" Harry bowed his head, his back shaking, self-loathing evident in his voice- he was gasping for breath, and was that a- was he _crying_? 

_He_ _was_ , Draco realised. What should he do? What could Draco do? 

He could try and help.

"Harry," he said softly. He looked away, still silently sobbing. "Harry," Draco said again. "Harry, how long have you wanted to apologise for everything that isn't your fault?" Potter's arms curled around himself. Self-comfort. He reminded Draco of himself in sixth year; when he had done that, his mother had pulled him close, sat him on her lap- though he had been far too big- and had just held him and listened as he cried. Potter never _had_ a mother to do that for him, Draco realised with a start. And suddenly he regretted ever having made a jest at Harry about his parents. 

Immediately, without his permission, his mouth opened, and he choked out two words, interrupting Harry's rant. "I'm sorry," he said. And just like that, a river of words came rushing out; everything he'd ever thought, ever wanted to say to Harry, to try and make things better. "I'm sorry for insulting you and your parents and the people who first showed you love and tried to help you, and for hurting you and them just because I was such a self-righteous _prat_ hung up on when you rejected me in first year- when I was being an absolute _prick_ , too- I'm sorry for my prejudices and my pride, I'm sorry for the Vanishing Cupboard, and for the Fiendfyre, and for everyone who died, I'm sorry for Dumbledore-" Harry started crying harder, so, as he spoke, Draco moved slowly closer to him, ignoring the painful prickling just behind his nose that he always got just before he started breaking down, and reminding himself that he was safe, Harry wasn't going to hurt him- "I'm sorry for everything I put you and your friends in, and for everything you went through, and that you saved me, and that I tried to Crucio you, and for Malfoy Manor, and for Voldemort- and-" oh, there were Draco's tears. They ran down his face in silent streams, and his voice choked off.

Harry reached out and wrapped his arms around Draco suddenly, buried his head in Draco's shoulder, still bare, his gasping breaths and his dark skin as hot as the fire that still burned in the fireplace. Draco didn't even hesitate before wrapping his arms around Harry in return, burying his head in the mess of black hair- just as soft as Draco had expected it to be. He didn't hesitate in his decision to keep holding Harry, long after both of them had stopped crying. He didn't flinch when Harry's arms randomly tightened around him.

After all, he was safe.


	16. Ronald Weasley, Hermione Granger, Pansy Parkinson and Blaise Zabini: Searching, and the Drarry Discovery

Draco and Harry stayed asleep at Grimmauld Place for far too long. They slept until the sun had set and then risen again, and through most of the next day, too. They were undisturbed in that time- well, nearly.

At about midnight, there had been a _bit_ of a disturbance.

. . .

After three hours of Harry being missing, Ronald Weasley got suspicious. And what do you do when something might be wrong? You go to Hermione, of course.

"'Mione," he said, that night in the Gryffindor common room. Hermione hummed in acknowledgement, but didn't move even to put her book down. "'Mione, Harry's been gone for hours," he tried.

"He does that," Hermione told him. 

"Well, yeah, but what if something happens?"

Hermione finally put her book down to raise an eyebrow at him. "Ronald, when has _anything_ ever happened?"

"Well- first thing that comes to mind is when he went off and _died_ ," Ron said. 

Hermione rolled her eyes. " _This_ _year_ , Ron. When he goes off, where is he usually? Somewhere with Malfoy, making that potion of theirs."

"That doesn't help!" Ron said incredulously. "What's Malfoy gonna do if they get in trouble? What if Malfoy is the one _causing_ the trouble?"

"Oh, if you're so worried, go talk to McGonagall."

"Alright," Ron said, standing up and going to the portrait-hole.

Hermione picked up her book again, glanced at Ron leaving the room, put it back down again with a sigh, and called after him, "I'm coming too!"

"Yes, Ms. Granger? Mr. Weasley? How may I assist you?" McGonagall asked the two, up in her office.

"Well, you see, Harry's gone missing-" Ron managed to get out before both Hermione and McGonagall interrupted him.

" _Missing_?" McGonagall cried.

"Well, not _missing_ , it's only been a few hours," Hermione said.

McGonagall turned to her. " _A_ _few_ _hours_? He used my floo a few hours ago, but has he not returned?" 

"No," Ron said. "We were wondering if you knew where he was, or if you could find out."

McGonagall, though incredibly worried, steeled herself, nodded, and shooed Ron and Hermione out of her office so she could start working on finding Harry.

. . .

She started by floo-calling everywhere he might have gone; from the Burrow to Godric's Hollow- even the Dursleys'. She had one last resort. 

"Kreacher," she called out. With a crack of apparition, the house-elf appeared in front of her.

"What do you require?" he asked. He'd been assigned to work at Hogwarts after the War, as Harry didn't want him staying in a old, dusty house when there was no one to cater for.

"Kreacher, where is Harry?"

Kreacher tilted his head to the side. "Master Potter is currently in Grimmauld Place's living room. Would you like me to take you to him?"

McGonagall breathed a sigh of relief. "No, thank you. That will be all. Please return to your duties." With another crack, Kreacher returned to the kitchens. McGonagall turned to the fireplace. "Grimmauld Place living room," she called, and once the connection was secure, she knelt down and pushed her head through the flames of her office into the still-burning flames at Grimmauld place. And nearly started shouting with joy.

"Albus owes me fifty galleons," she murmured.

She retreated from the fire, severed the connection, and made her way to the Gryffindor common room. At her arrival, Hermione and Ron bounded over to her, eager for news on their friend. 

"Harry is perfectly safe and happy," she told them. 

"Where is he?"

McGonagall recalled the image of the boys, snuggled up together so happily. "I shan't disclose that information to you two, or you would immediately go off searching for him. He is safe, and he is happy, and I have no doubt he will return when he is ready."

. . .

This, of course, did absolutely nothing to help Ron. It'd been three and a half hours of no Harry at this point, and Hermione was starting to worry, too.

Dinnertime had rolled around; as the pair made their way down to the Great Hall, they talked in quiet voices about what might've happened. Zabini and Parkinson were already waiting for the two when they arrived, and they seemed worried, too. When Ron and Hermione had seated themselves, they opened up their issue with the rest of their friends. Ginny (and Luna by extension), Neville, Seamus and Dean, and Parkinson and Zabini overheard, too. None of them would spread the news- who knew how badly Hogwarts would panic if they thought Harry was really missing, not just doing potions with Malfoy. (Actually, they might panic more at the second idea than the first. Harry _hated_ both potions and Malfoy. (Or so Ron thought.)) 

Their little group did panic, but didn't spread the news. Zabini then said, "You know, we think Draco's been missing for about that long, too. Usually they're brew- er, arguing somewhere together; maybe they're together now, too."

Ron's eyes narrowed. "If Malfoy does _anything_ to Harry-" he ripped off a piece of chicken. 

Parkinson rolled her eyes. "Draco wouldn't hurt a hair on Potter's head if his life depended on it, Weasley. Our problem is where they're at, and anyone else that might be with them." Most of the Gryffindors had stopped listening when the conversation turned to Malfoy, so only Hermione and Ron leaned in to hear what Parkinson said. "Y'know, there's been talk amongst the Slytherin parents about a new group of Death Eaters. People who escaped Azkaban and want revenge on Potter. I don't know if it's true, but he could be in danger. Draco, if he's with him, could be in danger too."

"Blimey. Well, that settles it," Ron said, standing up. "I'm going to find Harry."

Hermione's eyebrow's shot up. "You haven't even finished eating your dinner!" she exclaimed.

"Harry's _far_ more important," Ron said. Hermione's jaw dropped open. (That was sort of insulting. So what if Ron loved food? Harry was his best mate! Although, if Hermione reacted like this to him choosing Harry over food, maybe he needed to prove it a bit more.)

"If you think you're going off looking for Potter while Draco is missing and probably with him alone, you are sorely mistaken," Parkinson said.

"Yeah," Zabini added. "We're in."

Hermione looked around at the group, seeing their unwavering determination. "Alright, then," she sighed. "I suppose I'll come along so you idiots don't get yourselves trapped or lost or killed or expelled."

They'd exited the castle by the time any of them realised that they had no idea where they were going. 

"Well, McGonagall said she found Harry," Hermione said, "And she had ashes in her hair, but not on her clothes. So, she probably Floo called around until she found them. It took her half a hour, so it wouldn't be the first place you'd think Harry would go- like the Burrow, for example. So where would Harry go?"

Zabini and Parkinson, having apparently established that Malfoy would be where Harry was, listened and made a list as Hermione and Ron ran through places Harry might've gone.

"The Burrow, obviously; Luna's house, Andromeda's house; wow, Harry doesn't really have many place to go to. Um, Godric's Hollow?"

"Grimmauld Place? Hogsmeade?" Ron suggested.

"Wait," said Parkinson. "Granger, you said McGonagall Flooed the place? Wouldn't it be easier for us to just Floo around asking, too?"

"Where are we gonna get a Floo?" Ron asked.

"We can't use McGonagall's, or any others in the school," Hermione said. "Unless we bring our own floo powder, that is. Then we could use one of the house common room Floos."

"Anyone got Floo powder?" Zabini asked.

"Nope," the group said collectively.

"So, we'll need an actual floo where we preferably won't be interrupted."

"Well," Ron said hesitantly, "Isn't Grimmauld Place hidden by a Fidelius? There's a Floo in the main room, too."

"Oh, the old Black house?" Parkinson asked.

"You know about Grimmauld Place?"

She rolled her eyes. "Obviously. I'm a pureblood; we all go to each others' houses when we're young. I've been there, and Malfoy Manor, and Blaise's home, too."

"So- all you purebloods know where Grimmauld Place is?" Hermione asked.

"Number 12, Grimmauld Place," said Parkinson and Zabini.

Hermione groaned. "You could have all infiltrated us and found us during the war- and the Order- and even Siriu-" she started saying, but Ron interrupted before she could wind herself up too much.

"In any case, we should head over to Grimmauld Place to use the Floo. We need to get off Hogwarts Grounds to apparate there. C'mon," he said, heading towards the Whomping Willow.

When Parkinson and Zabini identified where he was headed, they both immediately began backing up, shouting, "Weasley, what are you _doing_? Do you want to _die_?!"

Ron just picked up one of the long branches, fallen from the tree, and (avoiding the flailing branches of the tree) hit the knot at its base. The tree stopped moving, and Ron entered the dark tunnel, trusting Hermione to lead the others after him.

He emerged in the Shrieking Shack, and made his way out into the streets of Hogsmeade. It was a quiet day today. The shops were open but not busy, and only a few people were roaming the streets at this time.

He made his way to the outskirts of Hogsmeade, over the edge of a snowy cliff. He remembered sitting here with Hermione; remembered Malfoy, being pelted by snowballs, and Harry playing with the strings of his hat. He smiled.

"Right, ready?" Hermione asked him once the group had gathered. She was taking Ron in a Side-along, while Parkinson and Zabini went together. He gripped her hand as the sickening feeling of apparating washed over him.

He somehow managed to not throw up when his feet hit the ground again; probably helped a lot that he had retained all his bodily parts this time. (He did do a double-check, just in case, and found himself fine.)

He looked up as Zabini and Parkinson dusted off their robes. The house emerged before him, a looming grey wall of foreboding. 

Parkinson stepped up to the door first; she opened it with a flick of her wand. The group entered silently, avoiding the portrait of Walburga Black, making their way into the living room- well, they started to, but Parkinson and Hermione (leading the group) both stopped in the doorway so abruptly that Ron walked into Zabini. "Bloody hell," Ron muttered. Parkinson and Hermione immediately turned around and shushed him, then tiptoed further into the living room. So they were being quiet, then? Okay.

Zabini blocked Ron's view for a moment when they entered; then he moved, and Ron nearly swore.

Harry was there.

So was Malfoy.

And they were hugging. No, not even that. They were- they were embracing each other. Ron's eyes widened, and he said, "What the bloody-" before Hermione cut him off, slapping her hand over his mouth. 

"Don't wake them up," she hissed at him.

"Wake them up?!" Ron said, his voice muffled by Hermione's hand. "'Mione, are you seeing what I'm seeing? They are asleep together! Hermione, they are _cuddling!_ "

"Yes, Ronald, I see- do you know what I also see? Harry is _smiling_."

Ron squinted at the pair and- yes- he could just make out the edges of a smile on Harry's face, nestled in Malfoy's shoulder. He suppressed a shudder.

The group stood there, watching Malfoy and Harry for another couple of minutes, each dealing with their own emotions at this revelation. Parkinson and Zabini seemed almost relieved, which was strange; Hermione looked like something obvious had just hit her, like she'd solved a problem, and was applying her answer to other situations. It was a look Ron had seen on her many times before.

Ron himself was having an internal battle, which continued even as Parkinson led the group back out, and as the group returned to Hogwarts. He hated Malfoy. They ferrety git had insulted him and his family for all of his life. He'd been prejudiced and rude towards Hermione- well, he _had_ been, Ron supposed. He couldn't actually think of a single time this year that Malfoy had insulted Hermione- especially not for her blood status.

And then there was that damned smile on Harry's face. He hadn't smiled in his sleep for a long, long time, being constantly plagued with nightmares as he was.

As Ron thought, Parkinson and Hermione started talking very quickly in very high voices about Draco and Harry. Ron put aside his inner turmoil for now and listened.

"Draco's been whining about Harry since first year," Parkinson said excitedly. "Now he'll _have_ to admit it was because he liked Potter!" Wait, what? Malfoy liked _Harry_?

"I know, I know!" Hermione said in response. "I don't know _how_ I could've missed it before; it's so _obvious_! He's liked Malfoy for _years_!" _What_?!

"But, knowing Harry," Hermione said, frowning, "He won't even realise for ages..."

"Well, until he does, we should give them a ship name to talk about them. A recognisable one, though," said Parkinson.

"Woah, Pans," said Zabini, "You don't know the gossip?" Immediately, both girls turned to him. "Wow, I know something about Hogwarts gossip that Pansy Parkinson doesn't. This feels _good_."

_"Spill,_ Blaise."

"There's already a ship name for Draco and Potter. They're calling them ' _Drarry_ '."

Parkinson frowned. "Hmm... It'll do, I suppose. Not the most original or names, nor the most secretive... Oh well, those two are so oblivious, they wouldn't figure out it's about them."

Ron, meanwhile, was suffering through the revelation Hermione had made earlier. _Harry_ and _Malfoy_ _like_ each other. 

Oh, bloody _hell._ They really did. And- to make matters worse- curled up at Grimmauld Place... They'd looked _good_ together. Comfortable. _Happy_.

Ron wondered if Harry's breakup with Ginny (that Ron had, honestly, been expecting) had been because not just one, but _both_ members of the relationship realised they were LGBTQ+. And maybe Harry's obsession with Malfoy would've been an obvious hint at Harry's sexuality- nope, Ron was _not_ thinking about this. The girls and Blaise could do that.

Inside Hogwarts, Ron and Hermione split up from Blaise and Pansy- as the Slytherins had insisted on being called- with a surprisingly amiable goodbye. As they headed up to Gryffindor tower, Ron decided that he would wait until Harry was ready to tell him whatever he wanted to until he drew his final conclusions. For now, as long as Malfoy wasn't hurting Harry, Ron would just avoid the subject as much as he could.

He went to bed thinking over what had happened. The only solid conclusion he came to was that 'Drarry' could be, with some effort, something he could learn to live with- so long as Harry was happy. If Harry was happy, then Ron could be too, because Harry deserved everything Ron could give him and more.


	17. Draco Malfoy and the Philosopher's Stone

Draco had awoken the next morning with Harry Potter curled up in his arms. He had panicked, remembering everything he had said the night before, and carefully extracted himself from Harry's arms. He'd flooed back to Hogwarts in a state of mild panic, ignorant of the disappointed stares of his friends- and Harry's- at the fact that he'd returned alone. 

Draco locked himself away in the Room of Requirement with his plants, tending to them.

Not one person appeared through the entire day.

Draco told himself he didn't care.

He spent the next day locked away, too; he knew he was fixating on this, completely ignoring anyone and anything else.

He hadn't even eaten since returning from Grimmauld Place.

He told himself he didn't miss anyone's cooking.

Viv was nearly ready. She was flowering beautifully; she'd have the leaf the potion needed ready that night, Draco thought. 

She kept crying, though, and reaching out for someone.

Draco told himself it was only Viv who wanted them, and not himself.

Draco noticed, as he watered his plants again, that his thoughts continued to drift to what he'd said at Grimmauld Place. He noticed that now, when he thought Harry, he thought of Harry; not Potter or anything else. Just Harry.

He told himself it didn't mean anything.

He'd been lying to himself for far too long.

He couldn't even convince himself at this point.

Draco left the room for nearly the first time that night; he attended dinner. He sat at the Gryffindor table, with Pansy and Blaise and Weasley and Granger. Harry wasn't there. He ate quietly, as much as he could stomach. 

He hated this feeling; he knew that something would happen tonight, and he knew that it would be big, whatever it was. He knew that it could be life-changing. And he couldn't share this feeling with anyone. No one else had seen and helped him in his labours; no one else had held and calmed his plants, no one else would feel the sweetness of their labours paying off tonight.

At least, no one who was there with Draco.

Granger asked him how he was doing; offered to come and help. She knew Harry hadn't come to see him. She wouldn't tell Draco where he had been; only that he would probably see him soon.

. . .

It was a full moon that night. The sky was littered with a thousand stars; pinpricks of light in the darkness. There were no clouds; the sky was clear. The air was cold and crisp and clean. 

Draco had decided he would make the Stone down by the Lake. He levitated all his plants and potions, all except Viv (who he carried), down to the spot Harry went when he had nightmares. He sort of hoped Harry would be there already, or would come down later.

He didn't notice how much lighter the cauldrons seemed as he arranged them; he didn't realise that there was more than just his magic arranging everything.

He set down the base potion he'd practiced making over and over; made sure it was the right temperature, and cast a stasis spell over it. This next bit was the most meticulous.

He picked up his silver knife- sharpened razor-thin- and took a deep breath. He held Viv's main stem still as he carefully- oh so carefully- cut off the largest of her leaves. She started wailing, but Draco couldn't wait and calm her; her biological structure and adaptations meant that any of the plant left exposed to the air would seal itself up quickly. Including the bit of plant Draco was holding. He knew Viv would be fine.

Viv stopped wailing quickly after Draco knelt down; he didn't take any notice of this. Nor did he realise that there was only one person, aside from himself, capable of calming Viv so quickly. 

He knelt down next to the chopping board he'd prepared, throwing the silver knife aside and picking up a bone-blade one instead. He dipped it into the small pot of red liquid- the blood-like sap from his Coccinum Pulchritudo plant- and quickly sliced off the main stem of Viv's leaf. He sliced tiny cuts down the center of it as the stalk began to seal up, _accio-_ ing his mortar and pestle; he crushed up Viv's leaf, making sure the the sap was fully pushed out of the leaf. Then he picked up his metal scalpel, mentally preparing himself. He cut a thin line across his Dark Mark, dripped one drop of his blood into the mortar, and mixed it in with the leaf. He turned and added the mixture to the potion, stepping back immediately... 

It didn't explode. Thank Salazar.

Draco turned the flame up to the hottest possible without melting his cauldron, wiping sweat from his brow.

The heat from the flame was potentially deadly now; he renewed his protection charms around himself and the area. 

After exactly thirty seconds, he stood again and turned the heat off with a neat flick of his wrist. Nearly there.

He picked up his gold stirrer- the only pure-gold thing he owned, though he'd begged his father for a gold cauldron in First year. He shook off the memory as the moon rose directly overhead. 

He'd memorised the instructions, but just in case, he _accioed_ them and had them float in front of him.

_Stir clockwise thrice. Then, while thinking of the Stone you wish to create and all its properties, place your head into the cauldron, such as you would with a pensieve. The liquid should feel like no more than a rush of warm wind over your skin, and should part for you._

_You must retrieve the Stone as one who wishes not to touch it. Should you attempt otherwise, the water will turn the same colour as the stone will be once retrieved, and will immediately clamp down on your head. If you notice this, retreat as soon as possible or risk your life._

The last paragraph had confused Draco to no end. _Retrieve_ _the_ S _tone_ _as_ _one_ _who_ _wishes_ _not_ _to_ _touch_ _it_. But Draco had no time to deliberate; he would do as the instructions said. He plunged himself, headfirst, into the potion. It felt like a gust of warm air. Good. 

He felt himself sinking, like one does into a pensieve, but found he was floating down rather than tumbling. All he could see was still golden. So the potion hadn't changed colour. Also good. 

His feet touched down on golden sand. Paths of magic, looking like rivers of golden thread, weaved through the air. The moon in the sky was a soft glowing yellow.

He felt a rush of air next to him, and the folds of fabric rustled against his fingers. 

Something had landed next to him.

He hoped, perhaps foolishly, that it was a certain someone. 

Harry pulled off the invisibility cloak, and Draco had to consciously suppress the urge to start grinning like a lovesick idiot.

Then he saw the look on Harry's face. 

And the paper in his hand.

It had a lot more writing on it than it did before.

"I followed you down here," Harry said, "After I saw this. You went down, and then loads more writing just appeared on the page. So I came down too."

Draco took the parchment from Harry. At his touch, the writing on the paper flared gold, like the surrounding landscape he was in. He read the new writing.

_Hello, Draco Malfoy, it said. Congratulations on creating my Stone. Unfortunately, it is entirely useless without completing the next step, unless you simply want to keep it as proof that you are as good an alchemist and potioneer as I am._

_I believe you do not want to do that, however; you want the Elixir of Life. For that, you need your heart's deepest desire. So, to make that easier for you, I brought you here. This is the land of the Aurae; the land of the Golden. Mr. Potter, beside you, has had some experience with a relic from this land, I believe. It will show you what you need for the Elixir. It is here, right now, if only you know where to look. But beware; all that glitters is not gold._

_Good luck, Draco. I believe you will need it._


	18. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, the Land of the Aurea, the Mirror and the Sky

Draco frowned. That was cryptic. Well- he supposed he better start searching for- whatever he was searching for. He started on the fields- but couldn't resist seeing what was gold and what wasn't. He picked up a little golden stone- there must've been thousands of them scattered around- and bit it; sure enough, it was soft enough to leave impressions. Real gold, then. He picked up a fistful of grass, and bit that, too, wondering if the percentage of pure gold differed from item to item here, or if it was all 100%- then spat it out, spluttering. That wasn't gold. He glared sullenly at the grass blades now scattered around his feet.

Then he remembered Harry; turned to him to ask what he thought of the note and the place- only to find that Harry had disappeared from his side.

He spun around wildly, looking for him, until he spotted a messy black nest of hair, buried in a pile of- well, it looked like gold, but what the letter had said was still fresh in Draco's mind, and Draco had learned (somewhat) from the grass. All that glitters is not gold. 

"Potter," he cautioned- Harry turned around for just a moment, and Draco wondered if he were imagining the hurt in his eyes- "Maybe you shouldn't-" 

And then Harry was gone, and so was the pile of- whatever it was he'd been looking through. Draco jumped backwards, shocked, then ran over to where Harry had been; now there was a hole in the floor, leading straight down into pitch black darkness.

There was a muttered curse, and then Harry hollered "Draco?" from below. "Lumos!" 

A light appeared in the darkness, illuminating the space. Harry appeared okay- he looked around himself first, assessing his surroundings. When he appeared to have deemed them safe, he gestured for Draco to join him. 

"No, you dimwit, I'm not going down there. You need to figure out how to get out. I told you you shouldn't have-"

"No, Draco," Harry interrupted. "Really. Come down. You'll want to see this."

Draco lowered himself, swinging off the edge of the platform and landing gracefully on his feet. He looked up to see Harry, looking straight back at him. But then Harry spoke, and Harry's mouth moved, but his voice came from behind Draco.

"Draco," he said softly. "Draco, I think I know what that is." He frowned at Harry. Yes, the voice was definitely coming from behind him; but Harry was stood in front of him. He turned around, and discovered there were five Harrys here. 

Each wall held one in its surface; they all faced the center of the room, where Draco and real-Harry were stood. 

Mirrors.

Except- if they were mirrors, why couldn't Draco see himself? And how could all of the mirror-Harrys be facing him, when the real one turned in circles, staring at the walls? Draco noticed, absently, that Harry's eyes widened as he watched the mirror, and his hand went to his pocket.

Draco himself, however, was still trying to puzzle out what he was seeing. He turned away from Harry, back to the mirror, and noticed that as he moved, mirror-Harry did too. Huh.

He tentatively waved at mirror-Harry; mirror-Harry waved and beamed back at him, and Draco stumbled back at the shock of how utterly _beautiful_ Harry was. Draco sank down onto the ground; next to him, mirror-Harrys two and three followed his movements, sitting next to him. When they caught him watching, they both smiled that blindingly bright grin.

A little unnerved, Draco moved closer to the first mirror-Harry he'd seen. He shuffled over, right next to the mirror, and rested his fingertips on the glass. Who was this strange Harry, separated from him by a layer of glass, who smiled at him like nothing else mattered, like he thought Draco was-

Draco stiffened; mirror-Harry cocked his head in confusion, frowning.

And Draco understood.

The mirror didn't show Harry. Well, it did, but it didn't show _Harry_. It showed who Draco wished he were to Harry.

But that mirror-Harry... That wasn't _his_ Harry. Not one bit.

Harry didn't smile like Draco was the light of his life. 

Harry wasn't concerned when Draco suddenly became alert and anxious. He didn't even notice. Maybe he could learn to, over time.

But what tipped Draco off was what mirror-Harry had done. Mirror-Harry had cocked his head to the side and frowned. Worried. Confused.

Draco's Harry didn't do that.

When he was confused, he blinked.

So Draco stood, abruptly, stepping away from the glass that showed him things that weren't true; stepped into _his_ Harry, who he could touch, who wasn't separated from him by a layer of glass. Apparently his Harry had been watching him with the Mirror; he stumbled slightly as Draco fell, looking at him in confusion. He blinked.

The floor opened, and Harry and Draco fell.

At first, all Draco could see was black. All he could feel was the rush of the wind, whipping wildly at his hair, his clothes, his skin; tearing at him as he fell, like when he fell from his broom in Quidditch. Harry's arms were still wrapped around him from when he steadied him; now, they tightened, hugging Draco close.

Over Harry's shoulder, Draco could see the sky; shade by shade, it lightened, turning from pitch black to a dark, smoky red. Then it continued to lightened, though becoming more and more vivid a shade of crimson; now, as the two tumbled, it turned blood-red. Danger, Draco thought, though he couldn't quite remember why. The mirror-Harry had played with his mind, and now real-Harry was clutching him as they fell from the scarlet sky, and- oh, Draco thought, the potion's gone red.

He needed to get out.

Now.

As he thought this, the wind that had previously been pushing against them, bringing tears to Draco's eyes, turned and flipped the other way- like it was pushing the pair down, rather than slowing their descent. Draco had the most peculiar feeling that he was falling upwards. But he still needed to get out. What could he do? He needed to go up...

What had he been thinking earlier? _Like_ _falling_ _from_ _a_ _broom_ , something in his mind whispered.

"A broom!" he shouted aloud. Somehow, Harry heard him over the whistle of the wind; comprehension spread across his face. He was already holding his wand- still lit with Lumos- and pointed it straight up, behind Draco's back. 

" _Accio_ broom!" he shouted, and Draco was pulled back to fourth year, when Harry had shouted this same thing when faced with a Hungarian Horntail. Its flames had been the same colour as the sky was now. He wondered if Potter was scared then. He wondered if Harry was scared now. 

Draco was terrified.

The broom came speeding through from the sky in a blur of brown; Harry somehow mounted it, now facing downwards in a nosedive position. At least, Draco thought it was down that Harry was facing; he wasn't quite sure which way was up and which was down at this point. 

Harry pulled Draco on behind him; Draco's arms wrapped instinctively around Harry's waist as Harry yelled, "Hold on!" and the broom shot towards the wind- upwards, Draco supposed.

As the sky turned the bloodthirsty colour of fiendfyre, Draco was thrown violently into the past. 

He thought of a room- a room where Harry's house was now stored- full of items; he thought of mountains of lost things, and of climbing one mountain, watching as flames leaped up at his ankles. He buried his head in the crook of Harry's neck as he thought of an image, burned forever into his mind; a cupboard, going up in flames, as one of his oldest friends watched him leave.

He'd held on to Harry just like this.

And he'd cried as Harry flew him away from Crabbe, flew him away from the room of leaping flames, the same colour as the sky all around him.

Now, he didn't cry. 

But his arms went slack around Harry's waist.


	19. Draco Malfoy, Harry Potter, and the Fall of a Malfoy

Harry could pinpoint the exact moment he knew something had gone wrong. It was when the presence at his back disappeared.

He'd been flying the two- himself and Draco- upwards, into the wind, towards the sky, hoping he could be fast enough to escape the potion before- before- he didn't even know what would happen if they didn't get out, actually. He knew it was bad from the way Draco had reacted to the sky turning red, from the panic in his voice when he'd shouted for a broom. Before he'd joined Draco in the potion, he'd watched Draco prepare and enter it; Harry hadn't seen the exact warning on the parchment where Draco had written the instructions. He hadn't taken the time to read the new writing that appeared once Draco had disappeared, either; he'd gone in headfirst and unprepared, as per usual. If Hermione had been there, she would've given him that exasperated look she'd perfected for Harry and Ron over the years. When Harry succeeded nonetheless- he always had done- she'd always rolled her eyes and berated him for his lack of a plan. So Harry had to get out of here, or he probably wouldn't get to see Hermione do that ever again. 

That was what drove him as he flew upwards, battling the wind; that, and the arms wrapped around his waist so tight it hurt. Harry couldn't stop flying, had to get out- because if he didn't, he wouldn't be the only one to suffer the consequences.

_Huh_ , Harry thought as he flew. This situation was almost uncannily similar to another he had shared with Draco last year. Then, he had been chased by fire, and the world around him had been the same colour as his was now; a deep, bloodthirsty red. A red that screamed " _Danger_!"

Both then and now, Draco Malfoy's arms had been clutched around his waist.

And then Harry was yanked out of his train of thought by the realisation that, actually, they weren't.

Draco's arms weren't around him.

The presence at his back was gone.

Faster than he thought was possible, Harry swung his broom around, leaning flat against the wood, and flew downwards in a nosedive- a Wronski Feint with no clear ending, he supposed. The wind was now pushing him downwards, making him go faster and faster and there! 

He spotted just the slightest blur of black below him, blurred by his speed; as he approached rapidly, Draco became clearer. His eyes were shut tight, limbs loose, his robes snapping around him wildly in the wind. 

Harry slowed the broom slightly, keeping pace with Draco as he fell, slowly urging the broom closer and closer and closer- he stretched his arm out, the way he did when he was trying to catch the snitch, and grabbed for Draco; he caught only a handful of robe, which tore away in Harry's hand as Draco steadily picked up speed. _Well_ , _that_ _won't_ _work_ , the calmer half of Harry thought. The other half was hysterical with fear.

"Malfoy!" he yelled. "Malfoy, wake up!" No response.

Panicking, Harry looked around him- the sky was far lighter than it was higher up; were they nearing the ground?- before trying one last time.

"Draco! Wake up!"

Draco's eyes snapped open, and he looked into Harry's eyes for a moment, looking confused and slightly frightened, before the situation hit him. He started flailing madly, his mouth wide in a scream torn away by the wind before Harry could hear it. His eyes were wide and frightened, his skin drained of what little colour it usually held. He looked almost like he had done in sixth year; deathly pale and scared. He turned to Harry for help.

"Take my hand!" Harry yelled at him, but the wind took the words from his mouth before he'd even spoken them. He thrust one hand out- the other still gripping the broomstick- and Draco, evidently getting the message, grabbed for Harry's hand; his fingertips brushed against Harry's, but the wind pushed them apart. Determined, Harry moved the broomstick right next to Draco, so they were side-to-side as they fell even further. The sky was almost pink.

Harry threw an arm around Draco's waist, and let go of the broom. He held himself firmly against it with his legs, pulling Draco towards him and helping him onto it. 

After a minute or so of struggling, Draco was firmly seated; this time, he wrapped his arms around Harry's chest and up, so his hands clutched Harry's shoulders. His body pressed firmly against Harry's back, and Harry could tell he was secure.

The two shot into the sky again; Harry urged the broom to go faster, faster, _faster_ ; he and Draco rose again, the wind battering at them; then Harry heard Draco say, "Oh! I am _such_ an _idiot_!", the arms around him tightened even further, and Draco pushed his body weight right so sharply that the two spun around in circles. 

"What are you doing?!" Harry yelled over the wind; Draco's arms stayed tight around him, and Harry felt the pull of apparition.

When Harry was let go, he immediately collapsed. Where was Draco?

His broom was far away from him, out of arm's reach; and though it looked a little battered and bruised, Harry could tell instinctively that it could be fixed up pretty nicely with some charms and the broom-maintenance kit Hermione had given him.

Harry turned his head to look for Draco, and realised that he was lying on a soft, fluffy surface. 

He shot up, looking around him; this wasn't Hogwarts, or anywhere else he knew. Where was he? Where was Draco?

He tried to turn around fully, but a pair of arms wrapped around his waist. "I'm here," Draco said; his voice was scratchy and hoarse, but his hold on Harry's waist was still strong. Harry was so relieved he didn't even try to argue that he hadn't been looking for Draco- after all, he had been. Draco had been the first thing he'd thought to look for after landing.

Which reminded him. Where _was_ he?

His first impression of the place was that he was safe. A strange thought, especially to have while in Malfoy- Draco's company. It was made only stranger by the fact that Harry felt safe _because_ he was in Draco's company.

The room was a comforting array of cool, dark tones- blues and greens scattered across the wall in such a formation that they looked like sunlight, dancing through water. Harry rubbed his eyes and realised that the colours were moving on the wall. Why was Harry surprised? He'd lived in the Wizarding world since he was 11. Still, to have the paint move across the wall- and not have a conscience- seemed strange. Well, it was pretty, Harry supposed.

The ceiling rippled, too, but Harry also saw fish- so well-painted he wondered momentarily if they were real. They swum across the ceiling, circling around and gliding out of sight. Harry watched them until his neck hurt from looking up.

So he looked down, and saw what he was sat on: a bed. Specifically, a blanket on a bed. A fluffy blue throw on a blanket on a bed, the same dark blue colour as the carpet. Why was he sat on a bed? Whose bed was he sat on?

The arms around his waist fell again, and it hit Harry. He was in Draco's room. Sat on Draco's bed. With Draco. And his first impression had been that he was _safe_.

Beside him, Draco had fallen asleep. Harry glanced at him; his robes were in tatters (he would be angry later, when he woke up) but they seemed to have sustained most of the damage. As far as Harry could see, he was unharmed physically.

Then Harry stood and gave himself a quick check-over; in the midst of action, when he was full of adrenaline, Harry often gave little notice to injuries he sustained. They usually went entirely unnoticed until somebody else pointed them out. He stretched, checking his muscles; then brushed his hands down his body to check for blood. He found none, but he was pretty sure he'd bruised his tailbone when he'd fallen down into the room of Mirrors of Erised; it ached, especially when sat back down again. 

He continued looking over the room, seated on the edge of Draco's bed. He saw a black cabinet and a matching bookshelf, a dark blue door he assumed was the exit of the room, and- upon closer inspection- another door, blended into the walls by the same paint and patterns which led to an en-suite bathroom. It had a bath like the one in the prefects' room at Hogwarts, with many differently coloured taps. Harry closed the door quietly and thought with a frown that it seemed far too bright; he noticed a window was open, and the sun was rising in the distance. It couldn't be morning _already_! It was night when Harry and Draco had entered the potion. Harry frowned and sat on the bed again, facing the window, and- _ow,_ what the _bloody_ _hell_ was that?

He stood again, reaching into his pocket, and withdrew- oh.

The Philosopher's Stone.

He remembered looking into the Mirror in that room, and seeing himself- his eleven-year-old-self, for some reason- pocketing the Stone. He'd been wearing the same clothes as he had been wearing when Harry had seen the same thing seven years ago. Like he had then, he'd felt for the stone and found it in his pocket.

It was the same blood-red the potion had been, slightly deeper than Harry remembered the first one being, but roughly the same size. It fit comfortably in his fist. 

The sun, having risen further, now shone a beam of light through the window; Draco rolled over his eyes fluttering open slowly. He saw Harry and his eyelids flew open, "Morning," Harry said, holding up the Stone.


	20. Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter Escape Malfoy Manor

Draco awoke to Harry Potter. Sat on _his_ bed. He could only barely see, though- he was almost blinded by sunlight streaming in through the window. "Morning," Harry said. He lifted up his fist, blinding Draco further as the light glinted off of something in his hand. Something... red. Red like the sky he remembered escaping. The realisation of what it was hit him like that punch from Granger in third year.

"You got the Stone?" he cried. 

"Yeah," Potter started to say, grinning triumphantly, but Draco interrupted.

" _Typical_!" he said, throwing his hands in the air. He swung himself off of his bed. "Of _course_ you get the Philosopher's Stone. Who brewed the potion? _Me_. Who went into the potion? _Me_! Who nearly _died_?! _ME_! But oh, _no_ , Merlin forbid _you_ don't get the Stone, because you're _famous_ _Harry_ _Potter_ -"

He threw himself onto his bed again, crossed his arms, and stared sulkily at the light of the waves on his walls. 

"Are you- are you pouting?" Harry asked incredulously. Draco ignored him.

"You _are_ ," Harry confirmed to himself, and promptly started laughing.

Draco continued to ignore him, watching the little blobs moving across the wall. 

Harry's laughter was cut short, however, when the boys heard a creak outside the door. 

Their reactions were immediate. Both boys reached for their wands, but while Harry slid quietly off the bed and readied his offensive stance, Draco started casting shield charms and silencing charms around his room. There was already a permanent silencing charm around it, but- well, what if it wore off at some point? Draco hadn't checked the spells of his room when he'd Apparated Harry here. He'd been a little _busy_ recovering from a near-death experience. 

"Young Master Draco?" said a timid little voice. 

"Oh," Draco said quietly, quickly removing all the wards. Harry shot him a strange look, but didn't comment. His only acknowledgement was that his wand dipped. "Come on in, Jisky," Draco called a little louder. The door creaked open, and a small house-elf stepped in. Harry's wand dropped completely.

"Jisky is sorry to be intruding, but Jisky was sent to notify Mistress Malfoy whether there was an intruder in the Malfoy House," she said, fiddling with her cardigan. Draco had given it to her when he was very young, during a very cold winter. She'd been his personal house elf ever since. 

He spotted her hands shaking. They looked worryingly frail. Actually, she looked far skinnier on the whole- even worse than she and all the other elves had been when Voldemort stayed at the Manor. He'd insisted that elves were so below wizards, they didn't deserve food. How could Jisky have deteriorated so quickly? She'd been fine before Draco left for eighth year at Hogwarts, and Narcissa would never let a house elf- especially not one that Draco held so dear- go without food. Draco frowned.

"Okay, Jisky," he said. "Well, before you report that- when was the last time you ate?"

Jisky knew that Draco hated seeing her unwell. She hesitated a moment before saying, "Yesterday."

"Jisky, tell me the truth."

She looked up at him with wide eyes, which slowly filled with tears under Draco's gaze. "Oh, Young Master Draco," she said, her voice quivering. "Jisky is so very sorry! Jisky never meant to go so long without food, but Jisky was just so worried about Young Master in Hogwarts, and Jiskey couldn't eat, not when Jisky's Young Master was away and maybe hurting!"

Draco frowned and Harry sat back, gaping. What month was it? December? And he'd started school in September. Jisky hadn't eaten anything _at all_ in that time period?

She must've seen the aghast expression Draco wore, because she immediately said, "Jisky is being very very sorry, Master Draco! Jisky will just punish herself-" she went to pick up a book ( _Quidditch_ _Through_ _the_ _Ages_ , Draco saw) but Harry (looking like he was far too accustomed to a house-elf habit though he'd never owned a house-elf) snatched it away before she could. She wailed and went for another book ( _Hogwarts_ , _a_ _History_ ) but Draco grabbed her frame carefully, stopping her from trying to hurt herself any more. 

"Jisky, Jisky," he said soothingly, "Don't punish yourself. I'm not mad. C'mon, let's head down to the cellars and I'll get you some food, okay?"

Jisky hesitated for only a moment before nodding. She led the boys out of the room, still sniffling quietly, and made her way down to the cellars.

Harry hesitated a moment before entering. Too focused on Jisky, Draco didn't notice.

. . . 

The cellar looked... strange, to say the least. Almost out-of-place, with its fresh-produce-lined shelves and small wooden cubby-holes. It was empty when Draco and Harry entered, but elves quickly started apparating in to take some food; just a loaf of bread or a block of butter and then _snap_! They were gone. Draco was unphased by this, but Harry flinched a little every time an elf apparated. 

Draco pulled Jisky over to a large bench (unused by the house elves, apparently). It was a slab of wood on a couple of mismatched wooden legs, and looked like it might fall over any minute. Draco sat Jisky down and started dashing around the room, looking out for apparating elves, collecting ingredients.

"Harry," he called at one point. "Harry, come here- I can't reach there, and you won't be able to either. Give me a lift?" 

Harry, not focused, waved his wand at Draco with a wordless spell.

Every house elf in the room dropped what they were holding when Draco screeched.

" _Harry_ _Potter_!" He cried. "Put me _down_ , you _oaf_! I meant like a leg-up!"

Harry looked over, blinking, and saw that instead of casting something like a _Wingardium_ _Leviosa_ to lift Draco up, he'd used _Levicorpus_. Draco had been lifted up... And was now dangling in the air by his ankle. Whoops.

Harry rushed over, and then stood there uselessly. He didn't know the counter-curse.

Draco was slowly turning pink from all the blood rushing to his head; "Do something!" he said. 

" _What_?" Harry asked.

" _Anything_!" Draco said. 

Harry had a flashback to first year, when he had been in a position similar to Draco's, while Ron was in his. What had Ron done then? Oh, yeah.

" _Wingardium_ _Leviosa_!" Harry said. The loaf of bread Draco had been trying to get floated down off the shelf and onto Jisky's table. 

Draco stared incredulously at Harry, apparently having been shocked into silence at Harry's response. " _You_ ," he declared, "Are the most _useless_ human being I think I have _ever_ met. You're even worse than _Longbottom_."

" _Hey_!"

"Hey yourself," he said. "I'm getting dizzy. Give me my wand." A house elf immediately appeared; it grabbed Harry's wand and passed it to Draco.

"Oi!" Harry shouted. "That's mine!" But the elf just passed the wand to Draco and retreated.

" _Liberacorpus_!" Draco shouted, pointing his wand at himself. He descended slowly, flipping sideways so he landed on his back softly. Then he looked at the wand in his hand. "Hey," he said, "This isn't my wand!" 

"That's what _I_ said," Harry put in.

An older-looking house elf said, "The wand was originally belonging to Harry Potter, but now it has allegiance to both Young Master Draco and Harry Potter."

"What?" Draco asked, exchanging a confused look with Harry.

"When Harry Potter defeated Young Master Malfoy in Malfoy Manor," the elf said, "Young Master Draco's wand swore allegiance to Harry Potter as well as Young Master Malfoy."

"Ohh," Harry said, eyes widening. "So now my wand swears allegiance to Draco, too?"

The house elf nodded.

"What?" Draco asked again. "Wait, never mind. Jisky, one more minute, and I'll be there. Well, Harry, now you're gotten the bread, I've got to make the sandwich. But we Malfoys have a special ingredient, so you need to get out so I can add it. Okay? Okay. Out, out. Shoo. The door is there." He ushered Harry out of a small, tucked-away door Harry hadn't seen and shut the door behind him.

The door led into a cramped stone corridor. It was dark when Harry first entered, but when Draco shut the door behind him, a small bronze sconce flickered to life, lighting the passageway with a dimly flickering flame.

At the end of the corridor was a small stone opening. 

Harry, of course, went through.

. . .

"Harry?" Draco asked, opening the door again. "Harry, I've finished the sandwich, you can come out now," he said. No one answered. 

Draco stepped further in, lighting his- Harry's- wand. The corridor was empty. Draco had the sudden realisation that there was only one place Harry could have gone to. Oh, _Merlin_. 

Draco took a deep breath and followed through the corridor.

. . .

The room was dark. 

And cold.

And damp.

It smelled of blood.

And sweat.

And decay.

The floor and walls were a blank rough grey stone that seemed to leech warmth out of Harry's body; he found himself shivering in seconds. But that might also have been due to the fact that he knew where he was; yes, he'd been here before.

This was the Malfoy Manor dungeons. He and Ron had been brought here while Bellatrix- 

Stop, he told himself. Don't go down that route. Not here. Not now.

He was at the back of the room; the front was hidden, enveloped in a darkness he couldn't see through. He went to grab his wand, and found nothing there. He cursed, remembering that Draco had his wand... and Draco was on the other side of the door at the end of the corridor. Well, there was nothing for it. Harry gathered all his Gryffindor courage and walked- more cautiously than he would have done normally- into the darkness.

. . .

Draco knew, as he watched Harry walk away from him, not to call out. He couldn't make any sudden movements, couldn't light his wand or cast spells. He knew well enough that Harry didn't need a wand to defend himself.

So he resigned himself to walking quietly behind Harry. This probably wouldn't go well.

. . .

Harry heard footsteps behind him. He stopped, and they did too; he held his breath, and heard the slightest exhale of breath.

"Harry-" Draco said, reaching out, but Harry rounded on him as soon as he felt the brush of Draco's hand against him.

He'd had this happen to him with Wormtail. It wouldn't happen again.

His brain didn't register that he was attacking Draco, not Wormtail, until he had Draco up against the stone wall; at some point he'd disarmed Draco, and was now holding his wand against Draco's throat. 

Draco's eyes widened and his breath caught; he stiffened, paling against Harry's dark-skinned hand. 

Harry recoiled quickly, almost flinching away from Draco and what he'd nearly done. He looked down at his hands, horrified, and stumbled away from Draco, who was eyeing him warily and rubbing his throat. He dropped his wand and knelt down, burying his head in his hands.

. . .

Draco watched Harry carefully. He'd moved so quickly, Draco hadn't even registered it until he was pinned against the wall by his throat. 

Harry had knelt, and he was slightly shaking; Draco was reminded, suddenly, of how Harry had looked before he'd broken down at Grimmauld Place. It'd been somewhat like this. 

Well, Draco couldn't have that.

So he'd just have to stop the breakdown before it started, no matter how hurt and slightly intimidated he was.

"Did you know," Draco said, kneeling down next to Harry, "I was once chased by a flock of multicoloured chickens?"

Harry's head jerked a little, and Draco heard a muffled "What?" 

He smiled, still a little shaky. So far so good. "Well, not really chickens. It's just- okay, let me start from the beginning."

Draco had always been good at telling stories. His parents and friends had marvelled at how skilled he was at weaving pictures in the air with simply a couple of words; he could make you feel as if you were in an entirely different world. It got better when Draco had been there when the story unfolded; it was even better when it was about Draco himself. After all, Draco didn't love anything as much as he loved talking about himself. Even if Pansy did disagree and gave him the Look. 

"Have I ever told you I sued someone as a toddler? Yeah, It's related. So, imagine. I was about- what, three? Four? And I was playing around in the gardens while my mother gardened and my father worked in his office.

"I get bored very easily. Climbing trees simply wasn't enough to occupy toddler-me. And what does my father have an abundance of? Birds. And I had been told, very explicitly, not to go anywhere near the birds. Multiple times. Now, being a toddler, I was not going to listen to that. In fact, I decided from the moment that I had been told to stay away from the birds that I would get the birds, and make them my own. I would clothe them and feed them and love them and my father wouldn't do anything about it."

Harry had slowly been lifting his head; now he was watching Draco silently. _Progress_ , Draco supposed.

"So, that one day when I was three and left unattended, I snuck away from my mother's field of view and over to the bird enclosure. My mother realised after a couple of minutes that I was gone; she ran up to my father's office and told him. They spent a while scheming about how to find me; in the end, they didn't need to. I nearly gave my father a heart attack.

"See, that was also the first day I performed accidental magic. There was a lock on the birds' enclosure to stop them getting out. I managed to manifest my magic well enough to get past it and into the enclosure. Except, I never actually entered the enclosure. The birds got out.

"So my lucky parents were able to behold the wonderful sight of me running, screaming, from a flock of very colourful exotic birds- flamingos, peacocks, parrots and toucans; the whole lot. And poor me was leading the flock. I glanced behind me when one of the faster birds nipped at my heel; I kept looking behind me, even as I ran. I veered off the main path and into a rather shallow ditch in our garden. But that's not the worst part.

"In that ditch is a fountain. My father placed it there so he would be able to look out of the window and see the fountain; he said it helped him think. So he and my mother had the perfect place to watch from as I tumbled into the fountain. The fountain... full of murtlap."

At this, Harry full-on laughed, just as Draco had hoped he would. But the story wasn't over yet. 

"Yes, murtlap are pretty harmless; but they nip at your ankles if you get close. These murtlap started nipping at me everywhere. I was flailing and crying and screaming for help for a whole ten minutes before my mother came to my rescue; my father just stood by and watched. Actually, he has the memory stored permanently in part of his pensieve; he says he's never laughed so hard. He didn't even tell me off afterwards for letting all his birds out; none of them escaped, and he said I'd had punishment enough. 

"A couple of weeks later, though, I heard him say he was going to sue someone at work; when I asked was suing was, he told me it was demanding recompense for being inconvenienced. Of course, I went around for the next couple of months asking my father to sue the birds, the fountain, and the fish; he ended up actually giving me some money to shut me up. And that," Draco concluded to a now grinning Harry (Mission accomplished, he thought triumphantly), "Is how I sued someone at three years old."

Harry laughed; upon realising he had done, he looked at Draco as though Draco were a miracle-maker. Then he beamed at Draco; the same blinding smile Mirror-Harry had given him in the Land of the Aurae. Draco felt physically shaken.

"Thank you," Harry said. And then, almost looking shy, he reached out and hugged Draco.

Draco felt himself melting, and suddenly that Pansy he seemed to have in his mind spoke up- she said, "Doesn't seem like you hate him very much. In fact, I might even say you like him. Perhaps," she added, "as more than a friend." The fact that Draco didn't argue back was an answer enough for her.

Draco didn't ask why Harry hugged him or thanked him. He didn't want to get into that. He just stood and said, "Come on then, Harry. I need to make sure Jisky actually ate her sandwich."

Jisky had eaten; she was waiting patiently for Draco and Harry when they returned. "Jisky will be leading Harry Potter and Young Master Draco out of the House now," she said. She took both their hands and apparated them to the edge of the Malfoy grounds; Harry and Draco needed only to step out and they would be out of the apparition wards and able to apparate to just outside Hogwarts grounds.

"Thank you, Jisky," Draco said. "I'll probably be gone until Christmas this time- not quite as long as before- but I'll be fine. Really. You just keep eating, okay?"

Jisky nodded, waved goodbye, and Disapparated. 

"Ready?" Harry asked Draco.

"Ready," Draco replied, and together the two apparated back to the boundaries of Hogwarts,


	21. Draco Malfoy, Erised, and Packing for Christmas

Draco was very easily distracted. It didn't take long after he left Malfoy Manor with Harry to forget most of what had happened in the Land of the Aurae. Especially not with Christmas right around the corner.

"You can almost feel it," Pansy said one morning at the Slytherin table, munching on a slice of buttered toast. "And you can definitely smell it, what with the early snow arriving and all the mince pies the elves have been making."

"Yeah," Blaise said. "There's some sort of magic about Christmas, I swear. It's like this palpable excitement in the air that begins sometime in November and just hits you in December. Say, Draco, you're going home to the Manor this year, aren't you?"

Draco, whose mind had been on trying to get the Elixir of Life, was sufficiently distracted. "That's the plan. Although it is a little shaky, what with the potion and all..."

"Yeah. Hey, what do you guys think we'll get this year? I hope I get something good... Last year I just got clothes."

Pansy looked aghast. " _Only_ got clothes? I only got a _couple_ of robes! And they weren't even _in_ - _season_ robes! Merlin, I would give _anything_ to have relatives with a good fashion sense," she said dreamily. "But I suppose Draco here will just have to suffice," She sighed, standing and ruffling Draco's hair. 

"Hey!" he protested, patting down his hair. He'd stopped gelling it almost entirely this year; it was far fluffier than ever before. Draco found it was also easier to maintain, though when Pansy had declared him "Almost cute," he'd come very close to gelling it back again.

"Well, it's been lovely eating with you boys, but I have a girls' day off to plan with Millicent," Pansy said. "Ciao." And she was gone, arm linked through Millicent Bulstrode's, already talking in excited voices about fashion and trends and winter clothes. 

"Hey, Blaise," Draco said, "Have you done your shopping yet?"

Blaise rolled his eyes. "Of course not, Draco. You know I'm a last-minute shopper. You yell at me about it every year," he replied. Draco shuddered at the thought of leaving things so last-minute. He could _never_. "I suppose you finished all your shopping- what, last year?" Blaise asked him.

"Oh, shush, Blaise. Just because I'm _organised_. No, I finished about a week ago. Well, I _think_ I finished," he amended. Blaise took one look at Draco and groaned.

" _Don't_ , Draco, _please_ ," he said. 

Draco blinked. "What?"

"You do this _every_ _bloody_ _year_. You get all your shopping done a month before Christmas, and then you deliberate on buying a present for Potter- of all people, _Potter_!- for the last _month_. _Every_ _year_ , Draco, every _goddamn_ year, you get him a present on the twenty-fourth, and you don't send it. _Seriously_. You keep them in your dresser in your house, in the second drawer up from the bottom, in the secret compartment at the back. _Please_ , Draco, I _can't_ listen to you wondering whether it's okay to get Potter a present for another _month_ ; just buy him one, I'm begging you, and give it to him when you give out all your other presents. _Please_."

"I do _not_ do- do _that_!" Draco protested. 

" _Ha_!"

"I _don't_!"

"Okay then. First year- part of some broken Mirror you said always showed Potter's eye. Second year- snake pendant that said "Heir" on it. And it was a _Malfoy_ _heirloom_. When your father found out it was missing, he flew into a rage. Never suspected _you_ , of course. Third year- a poster of Sirius Black. Fourth year- a portion of the flame from the Cup... _and_ a _ferret_ _sculpture_. A bloody _ferret_ \- anyway. Fifth year- a leftover Potter Stinks badge you found. You know, when Pansy gave you that and suggested you give it to Potter, she'd enchanted it so instead of supporting Diggory, the other side declared your love for Potter."

" _Excuse_ _me?_ "

"Sums up your personality pretty well, I think. Oh, you were mad at him sixth year. You didn't get him a present. Seventh year you had a voice recording of the Slytherins singing Weasley is Our King, with you conducting. To cheer him up, you said. Merlin, Draco, what will it be this year? A love declaration?"

"It will not!" Draco protested. The food had disappeared sometime during Blaise's revealment speech, and Blaise grabbed Draco's stuff before he began heading off to class. Draco chased after him, but he levitated Draco's bag into the air, just out of Draco's reach. He then led Draco out of the Great Hall and down the corridor towards his first period class- Transfiguration with the Gryffindors- arguing with Draco about what he would get Harry for Christmas.

In all honesty, Draco had actually been considering giving Harry a present; especially now that they weren't proper enemies like before. In any case, Blaise had been lying about most of the presents; Draco had never even considered giving Harry the Malfoy heirloom, and the Flame had been for a Beauxbaton student to take back to France and give to an acquaintance of Draco's as a present. It was just _coincidence_ that her name was Harry- short for Harrietta- too. The only gift Draco had actually considered was, in fact, the Potter Stinks badge; and only because that had been the year Harry dropped out of school to- y'know- save the world. 

Draco was so distracted by his thoughts, he didn't fully register everything Blaise had said until he reached the Room of Requirement. Then he turned and bolted back down the corridors, leaping down the stairs to McGonagall's classroom; he burst in and grabbed Blaise, hauling him outside by the tail of his robes.

"Oi!" Blaise protested. "These are expensive!" 

"Mr. Malfoy!" McGonagall disciplined. "What do you think you're do-" 

Her voice was cut off when Draco shut the door. Whoops. He'd be in trouble for that later. But for now... "Blaise," he said. "This is urgent. What did you say I nearly gave Potter in first year?"

"Um-" Blaise looked caught off-guard. "A mirror shard you said only showed Potter's eyes when you looked."

Draco stiffened. He'd seen Potter's eyes in a mirror before. 

"Blaise, where did I find the mirror shard?"

"Um... Merlin, Draco, I don't know. Why, anyway?"

"You remember that potion I was making?"

Blaise's eyes widened. "Oh. Um, I think you said something about a room down the corridor from the library?"

Draco frowned, concentrating. He waved Blaise off in the direction of the door in dismissal, then scoured his memory for such a room. There weren't really any rooms near the library; Madam Pince hadn't wanted any noise near the room, and had insisted on one of the most isolated rooms in Hogwarts. Well, Draco supposed he could at least have a look around; but first he should probably apologise to McGonagall- wait! _McGonagall_! Surely, if _anyone_ were to know the layout of Hogwarts, it would be her.

Draco opened the door again, walking confidently up to McGonagall and asked, quietly, "Are there any rooms near the library? Any at all?"

"Why do you need to know this, Mr. Malfoy?"

"The potion."

"Ah. I apologise; I do not know. However, I believe someone in this very room has an item that shows the entire layout of Hogwarts..." She looked at Harry.

Oh. Harry's Map.

"Thanks, Professor. I won't be long," Draco said. She rolled her eyes as Draco grabbed Harry and pulled him out of the classroom. Longbottom and a couple other Gryffindors very much looked like they wanted to follow, but one stern look from McGonagall kept them in their seats.

"What do you want, Draco?" Harry asked once Draco had dragged him outside.

"I need your Map," Draco said.

Harry blinked. "My... The Marauders' Map?"

"Yeah, that one. It's for the Elixir."

"What-"

"It'd take too long to explain. Come on, Po- Harry. Please."

Harry took a long breath in, then seemed to deflate. "Alright, then. You say, 'I solemnly swear that I am up to no good,' to open it; you say 'Mischief Managed' to close it. Be careful, please."

"I will be," Draco called back, already walking away. 

How come it always Harry watching him leave?

The Map showed that there was, indeed, a room near the library. Two large, plain wooden doors were set seamlessly into the walls, so cohesive with the design of Hogwarts they didn't stand out at all. 

They opened with a creak; Draco shivered as he entered the room. The walls and floor were a rough grey stone, absorbing his heat and radiating coldness. The room was relatively plain; a single window was set into the back wall, letting a small square of weak winter sunlight into the dim room; other than that, the only noticeable decoration was- a mirror?

Draco stepped forwards, into the reflection of the mirror. It was fractured, a spiderweb of broken lines criss-crossing the surface; a fragment of the mirror was missing, right about where Draco's eyes would've been when he was younger. Now, that spot was over his chest- over his heart. 

In the mirror was another Harry. 

But Draco was there with him this time. 

He was smiling again, looking at Draco- mirror-Draco- with a stupidly lovesick expression; mirror-Draco smiled back. He looked happier than Draco had been in years. Real-Draco frowned at the sight. 

Then Draco's gaze caught on his mirror-self's hand. 

Mirror-Draco was holding hands with Mirror-Harry.

Why was the mirror showing him this? It was oddly similar to what he'd seen in that mirror-room, in the Golden place. Draco remembered his revelation from then. The mirror didn't show Harry. Well, it did, but it didn't show _Harry_. It showed who Draco wished he were to Harry. 

At that point, he'd wanted to be someone Harry could- would- smile at like- he looked at the mirror- like that, like he was everything. 

Now... What had changed? Draco was now in the mirror, he was holding hands with Harry, and he was smiling.

Oh.

Draco wanted more from Harry than just a smile now.

And- perhaps even more difficult to achieve- Draco wanted to be happy.

Neither of those were really able to be concentrated and put in a potion.

Draco looked at the gap in the mirror across his heart.

Or... Maybe they could be.


	22. Draco Malfoy, Pansy Parkinson, Blaise Zabini, Hermione Granger and Ronald Weasley go Shopping (And then Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy build Snowmen together)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is just a ton of Christmassy fluff. Hope you enjoy!

Draco took a shard of the Mirror and ran towards the Room of Requirement. He'd taken a large shard, one that held the image of his and Harry's hands intertwined. It'd just been the most convenient to grab, that was all. It wasn't like Draco chose that piece specifically or anything. No, that would be ridiculous.

He threw open the door to the Room and headed to the nearest cauldron. He removed the staisis charm on it and drew out the shard of the Mirror, trying to recall what Dumbledore had told him to do. Something along the lines of liquifying the stone, adding the heart's deepest desire, and casting a spell to extract it. Okay, two problems there. Draco looked down into the cauldron before him. The _empty_ cauldron.

Salazar's _slippers_ , he'd forgotten to take the Stone from Harry. Yes, he had been a little caught up with Jisky and then the dungeons, but- ugh, who knew where Harry could be? It wasn't like Draco had his Map of Hogwarts. He sunk down onto one of the plush chairs. thinking about how long it would take Harry to go to the Room and how he really, really needed the Stone.

. . .

Meanwhile, down in McGonagall's class, Harry felt the strangest tug at the back of his head. He shook his head to clear it, then continued on the essay he was writing.

The tug got stronger.

He huffed, scratching at it, and returned to his essay once more.

There came one more tug, so strong Harry was toppled backwards over his chair. Every eye in the classroom turned to him.

"Is there a problem, Mr. Potter?" McGonagall asked.

"Sorry, Professor," he said, standing up. "I really don't know what happ-" All of a sudden, he was pulled up off his feet, in a sort of Levicorpus-type spell... But nobody had their wands out. 

The students all jolted backwards in shock, chairs scraping across the floor, while McGonagall moved slowly towards Harry. "Mr. Potter?"

She reached out a hand, but before she so much as touched him, the door swung open of its own accord, and Harry went flying out of it.

. . .

Draco, still sat in his chair in the Room of Requirement, was scowling at the thought of having to possibly wait until mealtime to grab Harry when the doors opened and Harry bloody Potter himself came sailing in like a possessed ragdoll and was seated on the other chair. The doors slammed shut behind him.

"What," Harry said, "the bloody Merlin was that?!"

Draco gaped at him. He looked back at the door, and then at Harry. The boys stared at each other for a solid minute, visibly confused, until Draco understood. And then he groaned.

"Potter," he said, "I think I Required you."

Harry blinked. "You- what?"

"I required you," Draco said again. "I was just thinking- I needed the Stone, and you have it, so I needed you, and I was thinking about how I really wanted you here, and, well... The Room knew I Required you, and so it brought you to me."

Harry opened his mouth, then shut it, staring at Draco. Then said, "Honestly, Draco, didn't you learn? If you need something, just _Accio_ it."

He made the movement with his wand and a few moments later, the doors opened again; a small, red-orange stone flew into Harry's palm. "Here you go, Malfoy," he said. "Now, I'm off to the infirmary to make sure I didn't accidentally sustain any injuries."

Draco raised an eyebrow. " _You_ are _willingly_ going to the _infirmary_? Never thought I'd see the day!" 

Harry grinned. "Well, if Pomfrey hears about me flying through Hogwarts without a broom and not going to her she'll have a right go at me," he said.

"And?"

Harry's smile widened. "McGonagall's making us write a theory essay," he said. _Ohh_. Those were _terrible_. Yes, Draco would _much_ rather go to the infirmary than write one of those. 

"Well, off you go, then," he said, making a shooing gesture towards the doors. When Harry had left, he stepped back over to the cauldron. "Melt it, huh?" he murmured to himself. But he didn't want anything to go wrong... He set the Stone in the cauldron and turned the flame below it to a low heat. But... Even though this was far safer, it would also take ages. And Draco didn't want to stay and watch. So...

"Jisky!" he called. A pop of apparition revealed the house-elf. 

"Oh, Young Master Draco," she said, "Jisky is so glad you called on her. What can Jisky do for you?"

Draco took a moment to make sure she'd eaten- she looked far better than she had the last time he'd seen her, that was for sure- before asking, "Could you watch over this and alert me when it melts?"

Jisky nodded eagerly. "Absolutely, Master Draco!"

"Thanks, you're a life-saver," Draco said. Jisky beamed. He left the Room with a smile, wondering how long it would take for the Stone to melt. In the meantime, doors swung open on either side of him, and students flooded into the halls. Mmm, lunch. Draco headed down to the Great Hall.

Harry wasn't there when Draco arrived. Oh well, he'd be fine. He'd died before (twice, apparently); he could get through a short spell of levitation.

He sat down next to Pansy, who didn't even stop her conversation with Blaise to say hello. Rude.

"-nd then I was thinking that I needed to buy some more clothes for me," she was saying.

Blaise looked at Draco, his eyes practically screaming for help, but all he said was "Hey, Draco."

"Draco!" Pansy exclaimed. "Oh, perfect, I was just thinking about the Christmas shopping we all need to get done." Draco glared at Blaise for involving him in Pansy's dreaded shopping spree. Blaise grinned back at him. "None of us have done much yet, so we're all going out after lunch to Hogsmeade. I know for a fact that you haven't bought your annual Potter Present, so you'll be coming too. Lovely. Anyway, as I was saying-"

"Woah, woah, woah, Pans, slow down. First- I don't do a- a- a _Potter_ _Present_. Don't look at me like that, Pans. Blaise, shut _up_. No, I mean it. _Shush_. And even if I did, why would I invite you along to go shopping with me?"

"You're not inviting me," Pansy said. " _We_ are inviting _you_." 

Draco frowned. " _We_?"

"Yeah," Blaise said. "Pans, Hermione, Ron and I."

"Who are you and what have you done with my friends?" Draco asked them. " _Christmas_ _shopping_ with _Granger_ and _Weasley_?! Have you lost your _minds_?"

"Nope. Oh, look, Hermione says she's ready. C'mon, Draco." Indeed, across the Hall, Granger had stood up and was beckoning the Slytherin trio.

Pansy grabbed Draco by the sleeve and tugged him along after her, even though he resisted all the way to the Great Hall doors. Just as he was leaving, Harry walked in. "Save me!" Draco cried; but Potter, useless git he is, just stood and watched Draco be dragged away to be tortured. Tortured how, you ask? Shopping with Pansy Parkinson.

Hogsmeade was far busier on a school day than it would be usually, but the small group forced their way through the crowds. There seemed to be a mixed attitude around them; people crowded around Granger and Weasley, leading the group, avoided and ignored Pansy and Blaise, and flat-out glared at Draco, who was reminded exactly why he didn't go out often after the War. Weasley pulled back to stand next to him- many confused stares followed him- and muttered, "This will be _terrible_. Parkinson's somehow managed to get Hermione _excited_ for _Christmas_ _shopping_! Hermione _hates_ Christmas shopping! Says it's time that could be spent better studying. But- look at them!" 

Ahead, Pansy and Granger walked, arm-in-arm, chattering excitedly about Merlin-knew-what. Blaise joined the boys. "Lighten up, you two, it's nearly Christmas!"

Pansy looked back at them with a grin, ignoring the general disgust of the onlookers, and said, "Yeah, sour-grapes. Lighten up. C'mon, 'Mione has ideas for what you can get Potter-" Wait, since when was Granger "' _Mione_ "? And, even worse-

"You- I'm not getting Potter _anything_!" Draco spluttered.

"Don't worry about it, Malfoy," Granger said matter-of-factly. "Harry always gets you something, too." Draco stared at her, dumbfounded.

"He does? Wait- _no_ \- I don't care- that's not- I don't get him anything, though,"

"Draco," Blaise said, "You should know by now that you are a _terrible_ liar."

"Yeah, Malfoy," Weasley said, "You're blushing."

Draco gave Pansy and Blaise the most betrayed and wounded look, but they only laughed at his peril- the bloody _traitors_ \- grabbed him, and pulled him forwards. The crowd seemed to have melted away around him, and any judgements that they made went unnoticed by the group.

They went to Dogweed and Deathcap first, where Granger and Weasley spent an unbelievably long time helping Blaise pick out a plant for Neville Longbottom. After half an hour of "No, that's too bright," and "It's not deadly enough," and "Neville has 10 of those already", Draco strode forwards and picked up the plant that had first caught his eye. 

"How about this one?" He asked, holding up a _Mimbulus_ _Mimbletonia_. "Heard Longbottom had one before, and it died in seventh year 'cause he didn't have time to look after it."

The shopkeeper was clearly on the edge of adding " _Wonder_ _why_?" but a glare from Weasley shut her up. Huh, perhaps Weasley wasn't so bad.

"'S a good idea, actually," he said. "I heard Neville talking to Luna about how plants seem to develop a sort of personality, and the Mimbletonia also developed favouritism towards certain people. He sounded really fascinated."

"The Mumble plant it is, then," Pansy said with a clap.

As she went over and purchased it, Granger gave Draco a once-over. Draco had the strangest feeling he was being examined- or maybe tested. "Not bad, Malfoy," she said as Pansy returned to them. "Not bad."

Next was a short trip into Dominic Maestro's music shop. Blaise helped Granger pick out a peculiar flute that only played when the musician was upside down for Luna, while Pansy had Draco help her pick a new violin for Blaise. She ended up entirely ignoring Draco's advice and decided on one that played like a mermaid; _terrible_ above the water, but heavenly underneath. Draco dreaded hearing the first time Blaise would play it- presumably above water, where any _sane_ human being would play their instrument.

After that, Draco, Ronald and Pansy travelled to Scrivenshaft's for quills while Hermione and Blaise went off to Tomes and Scrolls to buy books and other such presents. "Bet you a galleon 'Mione will bring back at least three books that she's bought for herself," Ronald muttered to Draco. 

"Bet you a galleon it'll be at least five," Draco shot back. 

"Oh, come on," Pansy said, "Give her some credit. It will be at least ten."

"You're on."

The group spent a quarter-hour or so browsing through quills; Draco learned that he would be expected to buy both Hermione _and_ Ronald presents, since they were buying him things too. He managed to get Hermione a custom-made self-inking quill that would suggest phrases and other such improvements to her writing, and a paperweight of a small house-elf, which he had S.P.E.W carved into. He also had an idea for what to get Ron. 

He purchased Hermione's quill and paperweight and dashed unseen into the only secondhand shop in Hogsmeade. He'd seen what he was looking for in here before, in a cluttered corner, tucked away, and- there! He grabbed the pensieve and bought it from the kind old man running the shop. He withdrew his memories of rehearsing and singing Weasley is Our King with the Slytherins, and the first time he'd managed to successfully conduct them through the whole song; he duplicated the memories and stored them in the pensieve. He flicked his wand and the pensieve was sent back to his dorm room, where he could cast all the spells needed to keep it in good condition properly. Then he left, returning to the Quills shop, where Ronald was just buying his quills.

Spintwitches' Sporting Needs was next, where Ronald bought his present for Harry (a Quidditch ball set of his own, missing a snitch for some reason. When Draco asked, Ron gave a sort of half-smile and told Draco that Harry had a snitch of his own he could use). Pansy then walked up beside Draco and said that perhaps Draco could get Harry a snitch of his own as a present; Ronald rejected the idea and helped Draco make a custom snow globe that Harry would like. Then the two took their sweet time going over nearly every Quidditch-related item in stock, comparing items and advising each other on what to and what not to get. Pansy rushed off to J. Pippin's Potions (presumably to get Draco's present), but was back before the boys left (unfortunately). It didn't take her long before her impatience won out and she was dragging the boys away from the store to move onto their next destination- Zonko's.

They indulged themselves in the newest and best toys the store had to offer, then moved onto Honeydukes, where the group found Hermione and Blaise. (Hermione, it turned out, had bought _fourteen_ books; Pansy took her winnings from the scowling boys with a sugar-sweet smile.)

The group spent a long time in there, each getting individually lost in the aisles of sugary heaven. When nobody was looking, Draco dashed into the Post Office to wrap Harry's present. He made sure it was all safe and secure before he sent it off to his dormitory, made sure that the little snow globe wouldn't break. When he emerged, he looked around cautiously before stepping outside. Pansy somehow saw him anyways, and gave him a knowing look. "So the snowglobe _was_ for him, huh? Well, that's hardly enough. C'mon, 'Mione's occupying Blaise and Ron, let's go get him something _special_."

She pulled him towards the sole apparition point in Hogsmeade, heavily guarded (you never knew who might come through) and apparated them to Diagon Alley, leading him up to the Magical Menagerie opposite Florean's.

The door opened with the quiet chime of a bell, nearly drowned out by the animals' various squawks and squeals. It chimed again, a while later, and Draco left with a cage in his hands. He sent it back to his dorm room with a flick of his wand, concealing and protecting it with a few charms. The pet inside would be fine with its auto-replenishing food and water supply.

Pansy gave Draco a soft smile as he made sure it was okay and safe and happy. Harry didn't know how lucky he was, she shought. Draco wouldn't go to such lengths for most people. But, then again, Harry had never been like most people. Not to Draco.

They returned to Hogsmeade and found Hermione telling Ronald and Blaise about an enchanted muggle object that had found its way into the window display of a shop; a "telee-fone", whatever that was. When the boys spotted Draco and Pansy, they immediately turned to them for refuge, and the group travelled towards the Three Broomsticks for lunch.

When they left, they found that snow had begun to fall; just a light dusting of it, the sort of lovely fluffy flakes that landed on your nose and hair like a thin second layer. Weasley spun around in the snow, delighted, and with the help of Blaise, managed to collect enough snow to make a snowball and throw it at Hermione. Pansy and Draco stood back and laughed as she chased them. Her bushy, snow-covered hair would have made her seem almost comical as she stormed after them, if not for the slight terror that arose in Draco when she turned on him for laughing at her. He cowered behind Pansy, who laughed at him... Until Weasley hit her in the face with a snowball.

She turned to face him, quiet and slow- deadly, Draco thought. Ronald must've realised the danger he was in, because he laughed nervously and moved to hide from her behind a towering tree, but she whipped out her wand and suddenly he was pulled into the air. Hermione made to stop Pansy, but Pansy levitated him into the highest branches of the tree he'd been attempting to hide behind, and Hermione sat back and laughed. Blaise joined her, sitting on the thinly-snow-covered floor, watching as Ronald attempted to get down. Draco soon joined them laughing as Weasley slipped and missed a branch, managed to grab another, and hung helplessly from the branched. He looked pleadingly at Hermione, who did nothing to help; then to Pansy, who told him defiantly, " _Never_ throw a snowball at me."

Weasley struggled for a good minute before Draco said, "Oh, come _on._ It can't be _that_ hard." 

"Oh, _really_?" Ronald cried down from above, still hanging onto a branch. "Why don't you come up her _yourself_ then?"

Draco, of course, took the challenge. 

He leapt up to the lowest branch- which snapped, and Draco fell back down onto the ground. Blaise had turned red from laughter, and it seemed that Ronald might drop off the branch from laughing. Draco stood up and sniffed, dusting the snow from his clothes, before jumping up to catch a sturdier branch. This one held his weight, and he swung up to sit on it. Being an intelligent wizard, he immediately cast a cushioning charm beneath himself (something that Ronald had _not_ done) before continuing his climb. By the time he'd made it to the top of the tree, Ronald had finally managed to lower himself to a branch below him, and was watching Draco. When he noticed Draco's attention on him, he called up, "Not bad, Malfoy."

The view was simply spectacular, Draco noted absently; he could see Hogwarts in the distance, as well as the glint of the winter sun on the surface of the Black Lake. The Forbidden Forest was a dark spot beside it, and Hogsmeade sprawled out in a map beneath him.

"Well, this is hardly any fun," he heard Pansy say from below him. "Draco isn't the slightest bit afraid."

Uh oh. That didn't bode well for Draco.

" _Diffindo_ _Maxima_!"

Oh, sweet Merlin, Draco thought as the tree trunk beneath him was cut cleanly through the middle.

The tree began to topple.

Ronald (whose branch was shaking violently) screamed and held onto the branch; Blaise had fallen silent; Pansy stood back and watched. It was Hermione- bless her saintly soul- that saved him; she cast a series of lightening and levitating spells at him just as the tree began to fall sideways. " _Honestly_ , Pansy," she said disapprovingly, "What are you _thinking_? Someone could get hurt. Don't make the tree fall _that_ way. Make it fall-" she moved the entire severed section to the other side of the tree, away from the Hogsmeade path and over a snowy hill- " _That_ way."

Wait, what?

She released the spells holding Draco up, and Draco was thrown into freefall. His stomach stayed at the top of the tree, but his body went hurtling towards the ground; he gripped the tree trunk, screeching, and went down with a _crash_! and the splintering of wood. But it wasn't over.

He lost his grip on the tree and went rolling down the hill, head-over-heels. He rolled to a stop at the feet of none other than Harry _bloody_ Potter. 

"Er, hi. Came to see if anyone was being tortured. Who was screaming?" he said, and Draco felt himself falling head-over-heels again; not physically, this time. More... Emotionally. Except, he realised, he'd fallen a long time ago. It was just now, looking up at Harry, that he realised. And maybe- just maybe- he now accepted it, too. But only _maybe_.

The world was spinning, but Draco made out the crooked smile and matching glasses on Harry's face, and then the snow in his hair as he helped Draco up.

"It was Weasley," he told Harry, pointing a finger back in the general direction of the group, who were all doubled over in hysterical laughter. Useless, moronic, pathetic, stupid, _traitors_ , the lot of them. And he marched up the hill to tell them so. 

Harry's gaze followed him, and when he spotted Hermione's mane of hair and Weasley stuck in a tree, he did a double-take. He jogged to catch up with Draco and asked, "You're all out here _together_?"

"Not by choice, trust me," Draco said. "And I advise you to get lost before Pansy sees you or you will also be pulled along for clothes shopping."

"I would've thought you'd like that kind of thing," Potter replied.

"Not with Pansy," he said.

They stopped off for butterbeers and a clean-up before the inevitable journey, but then they were off. It was just past three, Draco guessed, when they arrived at Gladrag's Wizardwear. Ronald and Harry were trying their best to stay behind and unnoticed (by Hermione and Pansy, at least; Harry couldn't hide from the crowd) while Pansy attacked Draco and Blaise, forcing them to the front to browse clothes. Eventually, they split up into their separate trios; the Golden trio and the Silver one.

Pansy led Blaise and Draco up and down the aisles, her watchful eye on them at all times so they couldn't escape. When their arms ached from carrying the bundles of clothes Pansy had heaped onto them, they were sent into the dressing room to try on their outfits. Now _this_ was Draco's favourite part.

Draco had always adored trying on clothes; he loved strutting up and down the small aisle, doing a little twirl in his fancy suits and his stylish jackets. He liked tipping his hats, when he wore them, as he bowed; when the Golden trio joined them (having skipped trying on clothes and moving straight to buying them), Draco loved the rounds of applause he received. He loved talking with Blaise before emerging, comparing outfits and giving compliments and adjustments. 

Then Ronald came into his dressing room as Draco was putting away his last outfit (it had been a strong, collective "No," from the entire group) and gave Draco one last outfit. He handed it to Draco and told him quietly, "Harry will love it," and stepped out again.

Draco gasped when he realised what it was; he put it on timidly, careful not to tear anything. Outside, he heard a round of applause for Blaise's last outfit. 

"Draco? You alright?" Pansy called out.

Draco looked at himself in the mirror. Hmm. "No," he called back. "Pans, come help me with this."

Pansy brushed aside the heavy dressing-room curtains and gasped. "Draco," she breathed, "You look absolutely gorgeous."

"Thank you," Draco whispered back. "But I think it needs a little something more, and I wasn't sure what."

Pansy took a deep breath to calm herself, then stepped back to observe. "You're right. How about..." She flicked her wand, and Draco felt his hair fall loosely around his head; it was the soft, fluffy texture it had been when Pansy had called him adorable. He went to protest, but she wasn't done. "Sit," she told him, and advanced, pointing her wand at his face. He froze, knowing how badly this could go. But he trusted Pansy. "Close your eyes," she murmured. He did, and felt a wash of magic over his face; soft like feathers, smooth like silk, gentle as a breeze. Pansy stepped back. "Perfect," she said. Draco turned and looked in the mirror.

The first thing he saw was the outfit Ronald had given him.

It was a dress.

A ballgown, really.

A gorgeous dark green ball gown with black tulle, skin tight till the waist, where it flooded out into a poofy bell-like shape, with a short train at the back. It had shimmery full-length sleeves of a sheer satin-like material. The neckline was an Elizabethan Collar, clearly showing Draco's collarbones and the pale expanse of his neck.

Then he saw his hair; almost-but-not-quite messy, and soft to the touch. Finally, he noticed his face- or, rather, what Pansy had done to his face.

She'd put makeup on him.

Just a subtle bit of eyeliner on his lower and upper lids, paired with a light green eyeshadow. There was some sort of gloss- strawberry flavoured, he noted- on his lips, and the lightest dusting of blush on his cheeks.

Draco... Draco looked _good_. 

Satisfied, Pansy stepped outside of the dressing room and announced to the others that Draco had one last outfit that he'd gone all-out on. She waved her wand at the dressing-room curtains. 

The fabric rose upwards slowly, and Draco stepped out.

He modelled this outfit slower than he had the others, more delicately. He walked down the left side of the aisle, passing the group, who were silent, their faces painted with identical looks of awe. Harry's mouth was hanging open, Draco noted. He smiled to himself as he walked.

When he reached the end of the aisle, he performed a slow turn for the group; Pansy applauded him, which seemed to awaken the rest. Excluding Harry, who was looking at Draco, still open-mouthed, like Draco was the most perfect thing in the world, they all started to cheer and clap; Draco grinned at them as he made his second passage down along the right side of the corridor, on the other side of the bench the group were sitting on. He stopped in front of Harry, who was still staring at him, and gave him a small curtsey, slightly pulling up the hem of the dress so it didn't get caught.

When Draco winked at him, Harry blushed.

Draco continued his walk down the aisle, stopping just before he returned to his dressing-room to turn his head back and blow a kiss at the group- or, more specifically, Harry. They locked eyes, and Harry's cheeks turned the most gorgeous shade of russet.

Draco's cheeks were pinker than the blush when he stepped into the dressing room. When Pansy joined him to help him take off the make-up, she gave him the Look. "Don't," he told her softly. "I already know."

She looked up at him, surprised, then turned back to the make-up with a grin that seemed to stretch from ear to ear.

Pansy offered to buy the dress for Draco, who let her do so happily. It was a hefty price, considering the group were in Hogsmeade. He'd told the others to go ahead, that he and Pansy would catch up, but Harry stayed behind. As they watched Pansy buying the dress, Draco heard Harry breathe in deeply, then say, "Did you like wearing the dress?"

Oh. Well that was unexpected. Draco frowned; he hadn't really thought about it. "Well, yeah, I guess so. I felt... I felt good. Especially with the make-up and all," he said.

"Youshouldreallywearmakeupanddressesmoreoftenyoulookastonishing," Harry said, all very quickly.

"Pardon?"

Harry looked down at the floor, scuffing his shoes along the floor. Was he blushing again? "You- you should really wear make-up more often, you look astonishing," he whispered.

Draco froze. Did he just- had he heard that right?

"Oh," he said softly. "Thank you." He smiled at Harry, who smiled back nervously in return, and then Harry wasn't the only one blushing.

"I also think- um, I mean, you should keep your hair like that," Harry added. Draco thanked him again and made a mental note to throw out every jar of hair-gel he owned so he would never be tempted to gel his hair back again.

Then Pansy (who Draco suspected had finished buying her- _his_ dress a while ago and was just waiting for Harry and Draco to stop talking) interrupted, pulling them out of the shop with an insistent, "We have to catch up with the others!"

Outside, a blizzard seemed to have erupted.

As soon as they left the shelter of the building they were hit with a wave of cold air and a layer of snow. The wind whipped around them as they made their way up to Hogwarts, tangling Draco's now-soft hair. Just as they were crossing into Hogwarts boundaries again, the snow began to recede, and the soft snowflakes from before returned. The floor was now coated in a thick layer of snow, and every step made a soft _crunch_ in the fresh snow, leaving an imprint. 

Blaise, Ron and Hermione had waited for the trio; they'd stopped on the grassy- well, snowy now- area next to the Black Lake. Ronald was lying down on the snow, spreading his arms and legs at the instruction of Hermione, it seemed; Blaise was watching and adding commentary. When Draco got within hearing range, Blaise said, "We're making snow angels!"

Harry jumped forwards in excitement, falling on the ground; as Draco went to make sure he was okay, he began doing what Ronald was, only... Faster. After a few seconds, he called out, "Levitate me!"

Hermione stopped mid-instruction and said, "Oh my God, Harry, that's a brilliant idea! Levicorpus!"

Harry flew into the air; Hermione set him down beside the imprint in the snow he'd made. "Ooh, it's a good one!"

"Do me, 'Mione!" Rona called; she cast the spell on him and place him beside his imprint. "Why does yours look better than mine?" he asked Harry.

"You weren't spreading your arms enough," Harry told him. "Look, watch me."

He lay down on an undisturbed bit of snow and walked Ron through what he was doing; Draco lay down- very slowly and very carefully- on a different piece of snow and followed Harry's instructions.

"You're too stiff," Hermione told him. "Loosen up. Relax. If you're worried about your clothes getting wet or rumpled- well, we're magical. We have drying charms and ironing charms. Have some fun, Malfoy."

She flopped down somewhere behind him, and Draco tried to listen to her advice. To his surprise, it seemed to work. It was actually almost... Fun. He stood up, careful to stay inside his imprint, and jumped out. When he looked back, he could just about see how his silhouette was an angel; with his arms making wings and his legs making a robe of sorts. Huh. 

"Not bad," Hermione said as she passed him. "But still, loosen up a bit more. You're frowning at it like it's a bad test result."

Draco made a noise of protest, found a new bit of grass to make an angel on, and made three. "Granger, come look at this! I made three!" he called out to her. She walked over and gave him a nod of approval; he beamed triumphantly. "Oi, Weasley," he shouted, "Bet my angels are better than yours!"

"Ha! You _wish_ , Malfoy!"

"No, look, I have _three_. How many do you have?"

"Only _three_? I have _five_!"

Draco gasped in outrage. That would _not_ do. He threw himself down and made more, and more, and more, as Weasley did the same; eventually, lost in their competition, Draco lost track of his surroundings and bumped into Pansy, who was sat next to Harry, both of them making small... What were _those_? They were adorable!

Immediately and effectively distracted from his snow angels, he asked the pair what they'd made.

"They're snowmen," Harry told him. "You make snowballs, but bigger, and put them on top of each other to make people."

"Yeah, look, here's the head, with a happy face," Pansy told him, pointing at the top snowball on her snowman, who did, indeed, have a smiley face drawn into him, "And these two are the body, and these sticks are the arms. Harry says you can make a big snowman, too, and put a scarf on it, but he didn't want to make a big one with you and Ronald rolling around making snow angels," she added.

"Hey, Malfoy, what're you- blimey, Harry, what are those? They're adorable!"

Pansy grinned and explained them to him proudly; Hermione watched on, clearly entertained by the purebloods' collective lack of knowledge in this area, while Blaise went to get them all hot chocolate. Harry took Malfoy aside, where there was lots of fresh snow, and showed him how to make the snowball big enough to be a proper snowman. Draco made one about the side of his own head while Harry made one about three times the size to be the body. Draco bit his lip in concentration as he placed the head on the body. Harry sent him off searching for sticks to use as arms while Hermione accio-ed a scarf she'd knitted to go around the snowman's "neck", and Harry went down to the shores of the Black Lake. He returned with two large black pebbles and a handful of little grey and black ones; he put the two large ones into the face as eyes, then arranged the small pebbles in a smile. "Now all we need is a carrot," he said.

Draco blinked. "A carrot?"

"Yeah. Dobby!" With a crack of apparition, Dobby appeared. "Could you get me a carrot, please?" 

"Right away!" Dobby cried. A few moments later he reappeared with a carrot, which he handed to Harry happily, then disapparated. Harry turned to the snowman.

"Okay, just in the middle... and... there!" He stepped back, allowing the others to see what he'd done. The carrot was... A nose? Yes! A nose! 

The snowman as a whole was rather spectacular; it came up to about Draco's shoulder. "Not too shabby for a first attempt," Harry said. "Well done." Draco beamed. "Even if I _did_ do most of the work myself."

" _What_?!" Draco cried. "Oh, it's _on_ , Potter." He immediately set about making a new snowman, a better one; it would be the biggest snowman ever. When the head was about as tall as Draco was, he moved onto the body. He ended up having to use magic to help with that. He levitated the head up on top of the body, making sure it stayed firm, before bringing it down again. Blaise had re-emerged with hand-made hot chocolates and passed them around, keeping two aside for Harry and Draco. 

Draco summoned Jisky and had her bring him the largest carrot she could find; while she set off to do that, he walked down to the Black Lake and selected the finest small boulders for the eyes, and several slightly smaller rocks for the mouth. He arranged them on the face to make a happy smile with two round-ish eyes before Jisky arrived back with a carrot taller than herself. Draco took it and dismissed her back to the Room of Requirement with a smile and his thanks.

He then walked over to the edge of the Forbidden Forest, leaving Pansy and Blaise to guard his snowman, and picked two massive tree branches to be arms. He levitated them back over to the snowman and pushed them into the sides of the body. Then he carefully- oh so carefully- pushed the carrot into the snowman's head, with Blaise and Pansy stood behind the snowman head and supporting it to make sure it wouldn't roll away.

They returned to their seats with their hot chocolates as Draco waited (quite chivalrously, if he did say so himself) for Harry to finish. As he waited, he made a few other tiny snowmen, like the ones Pansy had made before. He arranged those by the base of the snowman as he waited. When Potter was finally ready, they both stood back and levitated their snowmen heads up onto the bodies. Draco made sure his was balanced meticulously, then realised he was missing something. The _scarf_. But what scarf was big enough to go around a neck as wide as Draco was tall? Hmmm...

Oh.

Draco was a wizard. Duh.

He took Hermione's scarf (Hermione had come prepared for the winter weather, unlike the rest of them) and enlarged it so he was barely able to lift it; then he levitated it up and wrapped it around the snowman's shoulders. He then focused the levitation on just one end of the scarf, the longer end, looping it over and under and around and through, then pulling, making a perfect knot that sat snugly around the snowman's neck. He sat and picked up his hot chocolate as he waited for Potter to finish.

By this point, students inside the school had started coming out to have a look at the snowman-building competition; the younger muggleborns were delighting in the snow, making their own snowmen and snow-angels. The older ones appeared to have started a mass snowfight, with small teams of all houses and years popping up and making truces until two large ones remained; the more experienced wizards and witches had constructed a small snow fort on one side of the appointed battlefield, while the other appeared to have begun a snowball factory, passing snowballs along to the best throwers, who took aim and shot at any head that peaked above the enemy's fortress. Ron and Blaise were betting on who would win, laughing and cheering and commenting to each other about spectacular techniques and shots and hits. 

Harry came and sat next to Draco, grinning, and picked up his hot chocolate. "Magical, isn't it," he said.

"The snow?"

"Yeah. It brings everyone together better than any other inter-house event could; I mean, look at them," he said, pointing at the snowball war. "I'm pretty sure they're the only reason McGonagall hasn't told everyone to go inside yet."

"Actually, Harry," Hermione said, "I think that that might be why." She pointed out a second group of people playing in the snow, throwing snowballs. The- the _teachers_?

As they watched, Sprout hit Binns with snowball... except it sailed right through him and hit McGonagall squarely in the head. 

"Uh oh," Harry said from beside Draco, grinning. 

"Uh oh indeed," Draco smirked as McGonagall used her wand to levitate an army of snowballs and send them hurtling at Sprout. A few hit Hagrid's cabin; he came out a moment later, and seeing what was happening, quickly joined in the fun.

"Hey, Draco," Pansy said, drawing Draco's attention away from the teachers. "Look."

Draco turned around and saw that she had moved the snowmen, rearranged them so that they looked towards Hogwarts, with their wood-arms... Oh. They were holding hands. 

And Pansy had drawn a lightning scar on Harry's one and charmed the scarf on Draco's to be a Slytherin green and silver, so that it looked like Harry and Draco holding hands.

Draco blushed bright pink. It looked far too much like what he'd seen in the Mirror of Erised. Beside him, Harry was blushing again too... But neither of them made any move to change the snowmen. 

Draco jumped as a sort of roar emanated from the teachers' snowball fight, followed by an almighty splash, and every single person out in the snow froze, looking to see what had happened. 

Ripples spread out across the lake, and then a series of splashes preceded the arrival of something swimming to the shore.

Hagrid climbed out, dripping wet... And, following him, McGonagall, who looked like an angry wet cat. Both of them turned on Slughorn, who paled.

Everyone laughed as Slughorn backed slowly towards the castle, then began to run as the other teachers followed him.

Amidst all the noise and movement, Draco felt a hand reach out and take his.

Harry was still laughing, his eyes on the teachers, but his hand (unfairly warm after being in the snow for so long) had taken Draco's cold one. Draco felt himself melt inside; he linked their fingers and squeezed Harry's hand softly.

Harry turned to look him straight in the eyes, and beamed. 


	23. Christmas and Succeeding

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A bit late, I know, I know, but we're nearing the end now! Merry late Christmas to you all and thank you!  
> Special thanks to Yarrah for all your lovely comments! (You really motivated me to get this one done, thank you)

After half an hour of failed attempts to catch Slughorn (he seemed unusually good at hiding himself in the snowy landscape), McGonagall declared the rest of the day's lessons off; after all, it was the first snow of the year. She reminded everyone to be inside for curfew, then retreated to the castle for "a nice cup of tea and maybe a biscuit". Draco thought that that sounded wonderful, and was about to follow her inside when Jisky appeared next to him. "The Stone has melted," she said.

Draco froze, all thoughts of tea and biscuits vanished from his mind. He jumped up, pulling Harry up with him, and sprinted off towards the castle. "We can make the Elixir," Draco muttered to him as he began to protest. Immediately, Harry shut up and suddenly it was Harry pulling Draco towards the castle.

Behind them, Blaise, Pansy, Ron and Hermione all smiled at the sight of their joined hands.

"Took them long enough," Ron muttered.

"Couldn't agree more," Pansy said. "Well, now, Blaise; time for you to pay up. C'mon, c'mon, don't be shy." At Hermione and Ron's twin looks of confusion, she smirked and said, "Blaise and I had a little bet. He thought they'd stay oblivious to each other until Christmas; I thought they would get together before that. And, as you can see," she said, gesturing towards the boys disappearing into the castle together, "I was right. Oh, Blaise, don't try to cheat me, you cheapskate. That's leprechaun gold. That's the _seventh_ _time_ you've tried that on me. _Honestly_ , darling, it just doesn't work. Now, where's my money?"

Inside the castle, Harry and Draco were dashing through the halls towards the Room of Requirement. They paced back and forth together in front of the entrance, impatient with excitement. As soon as the door appeared, Draco flung it open and ran over to the cauldron containing the melted Stone. He knew the steps to extract the Elixir, had spent Merlin knew how long going over the motions meticulously, but just in case... "Harry, what's the incantation?"

" _Extractum_ _Aeterna_ _Aurea_ _Vitae_ ," Harry replied immediately. When Draco gave him a surprised look at his quick response, he half-blushed and muttered, "I put it in my memory palace." 

"Ohh. Okay. Any other tips you've got in there?"

"Er- yeah, actually. Dumbledore said you say it seven times- no more, no less- and add your heart's deepest desire."

Draco nodded and took a deep breath. He only had one shot at this. Where'd he put the Mirror shard?

He spotted it on the table behind him and to his left. He grabbed it- he refused to notice the glint of a golden ring that now sat on the pair of intertwined hands he could see inside- and lowered it slowly into the potion. The liquid went from a vibrant orange to a deep scarlet, almost the colour of blood.

" _Extractum Aeterna Aurea Vitae, Extractum Aeterna Aurea Vitae, Extractum Aeterna Aurea Vitae, Extractum Aeterna Aurea Vitae, Extractum Aeterna Aurea Vitae, Extractum Aeterna Aurea Vitae, Extractum Aeterna Aurea Vitae_ ," he said. The liquid seemed to evaporate as he spoke, turning from scarlet liquid to pink-tinged smoke of some sort. It had no identifiable smell, yet Draco was reminded of everything in life that he loved; his mother, his broom, the gardens at Malfoy Manor, hot chocolate and the smell of freshly cut grass, and Pansy's perfume and the rain and the snow and an overwhelmingly strong scent of Harry. And then... What was _that_? 

Ozone and fire and smoke and... Did gunpowder have a smell?

Harry seemed to realize it before Draco did. He grabbed Draco from behind and pulled him down onto the floor as the cauldron rattled and hissed... And exploded.

Was that supposed to happen?

Draco lay there in Harry's arms, terrified that he'd messed up; it was Harry who sat up tentatively first, peeking at the table. He scrambled upright and pulled something off the table. "Draco," he cried, "Draco, look!"

Draco turned his head, very slowly, to look at Harry. 

He was holding a small part of the cauldron, and inside it was a shimmering pool of golden liquid. The Elixir of Life.

Harry grinned at Draco, and an identical smile spread across Draco's face.

He'd done it.

He'd succeeded.

It was a good ten minutes of incomprehensible joy and shouting and general jubilation before the boys were able to move onto the next step.

Draco sectioned off a portion of the Elixir, just in case, before adding the necessary amount to his pre-prepared base potion for the Dreamless Sleep potion. Now, with unicorn blood, he'd usually only have to wait for the potion to stop bubbling until he could move on to the next step. He wasn't sure if he could proceed so quickly using the Elixir, and he did not want to mess this up, so he decided that he'd wait until he physically couldn't any more.

In that case, it'd probably be a while.

He asked Jiskey to notify him exactly two days after the potion would normally be done (you could never be too safe).

Meanwhile, Draco and Harry left the room, talking excitedly about what they ("Me, mostly," Draco reminded Harry) had done. Draco was positively bursting with excitement. He was the best potioneer alive! Merlin, Mother would be so proud! Snape, too- Draco froze midstep. Harry stopped with him, looking confused and worried and ever-so-slightly-scared, but Draco's mind was entirely occupied by another matter entirely.

Oh, Merlin.

_Snape_.

He'd told Severus he'd bring down a painting so Snape could watch and make sure Draco was okay.

And he never had.

Oh, Severus would be _fuming_.

He turned away from Harry and sprinted down the corridor, not registering Harry's shouts for him to "Wait, Draco!" in his haste to find out just how screwed he was. 

He burst into McGonagall's room, barely sparing her an apology for his interruption before he whipped around to face Snape.

Uh oh. He knew the look on Snape's face.

Oh, he was _in_ for it.

He returned to the snow outside with a pounding headache (honestly, portraits should have volume limits) and a damper on his earlier cheer. He spotted his group all sat watching the teachers (who were, apparently, now working together to build a snowman taller than Draco's (they were failing, obviously, because Draco was _far_ superior in the art of building snowmen)) and sank down next to Harry with a sigh. "Draco!" Harry exclaimed. "What happened? You just turned around and shot off- is something wrong? Is the potion okay? Are _you_ okay?"

"Um- yeah, no, the potion's fine, nothing happened, just-" his head ached just thinking of the brutal verbal lashing he'd received- "I, um, forgot to take Snape down to watch as we made the potion, and he wasn't happy about it. I decided I should go get the telling-off lecture now before he gets even worse, which is what took me so long."

"Wha- why did he want to watch?"

Draco rolled his eyes. "Well, firstly, he is a potioneer, and wanted to-" he put on his best Snape imitation, slow drawl and all- "Watch us fail in such a high-risk project; secondly, _when_ that project failed, he wanted to be there to make sure I wasn't hurt, and also to laugh at us-"

" _Obviously_ ," Harry murmured in his own impression of Snape.

"-and, in general, he's just angry that he wasn't involved. Oh, when I told him we'd succeeded, you should've _seen_ his face! _Priceless_!"

"Wait, Draco," Hermione said, "You succeeded?"

"Oh, yeah! Well, the draught isn't finished yet, I'm going to leave it to brew for an extra-long time, just in case, but we got the-" he lowered his voice- "Elixir."

"You _did_? Oh, brilliant! Well done! How long d'you think until you'll be finished?"

"Don't know; at least another two day-"

"Oi, Draco! _Heads_ _up_!"

Draco turned around to Blaise just in time to receive a snowball straight to his face. He sat there with the the most dangerous _I-will-make-you-regret-ever-being-born_ expression as the snowball fell to the ground. Blaise gulped. "Ah, just a- a little fun between friends, right Draco? Just a joke between us-"

Draco stood drew his wand with a flourish. Pansy, who had been stood behind Blaise, threw one last snowball at the back of his head before sprinting to hide behind the nearest tree; what good sense she had, Draco mused. Evidently, it was sense that Blaise had none of... He was still stood there, arms out placatingly, looking mortally terrified (and rightfully so) as Draco twirled his wand, and behind him rose a fleet of perfectly round, compact snowballs. 

With another swish of his wand, Draco sent the army hurtling at Blaise, who yelped and tried to run from them- honestly, what an _idiot_ \- before being knocked to the floor and pulverized by the snow. Draco sat back down with a self-satisfied smirk, sheathing his wand.

"Bloody _hell_ ," Ronald said. "Remind me not to get on his bad side."

Harry nodded his agreement, staring at Draco with wide eyes.

But, apparently, this was not enough. Because a moment later, another snowball flew into Draco's back, this one launched with so much force he was knocked off of his makeshift seat and onto the ground.

He stood and turned to face the direction it had come from- the main snowball fight, which was still going strong. The fight had stopped, however, when Draco was hit, and the participants had all turned to watch Draco. As he glared at the group, they all seemed to cower a little. Ooh, it'd been a while since Draco had terrified the younger students. He was going to have some _fun_. 

He smirked as he pulled his snowballs from around Blaise and sent them into the snowball battle, hitting multiple students and damaging defences, effectively starting the fight once more... Except now, there was a third side of the fight; the small group of eighth years.

Not even a minute had passed before every one of them had been hit by a snowball and brought into the fray. Hermione built up a formidable defense wall while Pansy and Blaise supplied the snoballs; Ronald was (for some absurd reason) shaping each snowball with his hands, making far less progress than the others, while Harry and Draco took turns peeking over the wall and flinging snowballs into the fight. 

When the eighth years began to slowly (but surely) dominate the field with their stronger, more advanced magic (and arguably better coordination, despite them being... Well, _them_ ), the other two sides of the fight came to a truce. Seventh years worked together to merge their defences and suddenly it was six (very advanced) eighth years against the rest of Hogwarts. 

Draco hadn't laughed and smiled so much in his life.

Curfew arrived all too soon; the teachers, snow-covered and grinning, herded the students inside. They were told sternly that there would _not_ be another snow-day like this tomorrow, and to get some sleep because classes started early as always. But even the thought of homework and classes again barely put a damper on the palpable happiness of the students.

The eighth-years all congregated in the Great Hall. Their curfew was far later than everyone else's, so they called for some hot drinks from the elves. As they warmed their frozen hands and feet, they discussed in their small groups what they would be doing for Christmas. A large portion of them were staying at Hogwarts, far more than usual; especially the Slytherins, and others who might want to avoid their homes. Draco, Pansy, and Blaise were planning to stay for Christmas for the first time ever. Harry was staying too, obviously, and Hermione and Ron had decided to stay with him. Draco heard Longbottom was staying, and he said that Luna was staying too. Good. Draco had gotten her a present, too, and wanted to see her reaction when she opened it. When he said as much to the group. Longbottom immediately turned on him and said, "You better not give her anything bad, Malfoy, or I'll- I'll hex you!"

Draco rolled his eyes. "As if I even could. Mother would have me hanged. No, you idiot, she's my cousin, I would never. I've gotten her something she's been on about for ages, I just wanted to see how she reacts."

"Oh. Wait, you're _cousins_? Scratch that- you're _related_?"

"Oh my _Merlin_. Longbottom. You're kidding, right? _Please_ tell me you're kidding. Have you even _seen_ our hair? _Yes_ , we're related!"

The evening passed in a flurry of quiet conversations and light hearted jokes; at one point, Ronald produced some of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes newest product, the Hysteria-Inducing Holly (especially for the festive season!) which sent most of the room into fits of laughter. Then came some rather peculiar sweets that turned the consumer into an animal; an old classic from when Honeydukes and Zonko's had collaborated to make the "best product for students" a few years back. They were in high demand amongst the eighth years, and the Gryffindors ended up summoning stashes of sweets they had hidden in their rooms in order to satisfy everyone.

McGonagall only realised the eighth years hadn't ever reached their beds when, come the next morning, she found them all asleep in the Hall (and others passed out in the halls of Hogwarts). She told them all off sternly and watched them doze off in her class with an exasperated (but undeniably fond) smile.

On Christmas morning, Draco shot up out of bed. Today was the _only_ day he woke up early without prompting; finding that he was the only one awake at- he cast a quick Tempus- 6:30 am, he quickly awoke his Blaise and Pansy (he found that a _Sonorous_ and a shout of "It's _Christmas_!!!" did the trick) before dragging them (still half-asleep and in pyjamas) down to the Great Hall, where the eighth-years had requested a large, communal Christmas tree. 

Draco's eyes lit up at the sight of the heaps of presents awaiting him.

He turned into quite a child at Christmas; full of energy for days before, jumping and leaping around the place, grinning from ear to ear. This Christmas was no exception. He ran down to the foot of the tree and just sat there, amongst the presents, revelling in the feel of Christmas that flowed through the air. Ron and Hermione had been eating at one of the tables; Blaise and Pansy approached them with murmured greetings and tired smiles. Hermione gave Pansy a sympathetic look when Ron bounded over to Draco; apparently he was a fellow Christmas-lover. 

He knelt next to Draco amongst the presents with a grin, then gasped as he was hit with an idea. "Draco, hear me out, please, but you have to do this. Okay..."

When Ronald had finished explaining, Draco gave him an appraising look. "Not bad, Ronald, not bad. Okay. I'll get the others, you get the paper. _Go_!"

Pansy loved the plan; as did Hermione. Blaise had added suggestions to the plan and improved it bit by bit until it was deemed flawless. 

They put into motion the preparation for it, having Blaise stand watch for Harry; soon, the teachers and other students began walking into the Hall; Hagrid walked in, and gave them encouragement, going so far as to provide them with the biggest spool of ribbon Draco had ever seen. Of course, he didn't see it for long.

"He's coming!" Blaise hissed to the group just as Draco was moved to his place. The others all fell into position, too, distracting Harry as Pansy added the finishing touch; a label that read, " _For_ _Harry_."

. . .

When the others managed to distract Harry from his food (Pansy just shouted, " _Presents_!"), they insisted Harry open the largest one first. It was a rather peculiar shape, and roughly the same size as Harry. He undid the spectacularly large ribbon atop it, then tore away the paper at the top.

Draco, stood under the tree, wrapped up like a present, grinned at him. "Merry Christmas, Harry," he said.

"M-Merry Christmas, Draco," Harry stuttered back, too surprised to comprehend what had happened.

Then Pansy and the rest pounced on their own presents; Draco wrestled his way out of his wrappings, winked at Harry, then turned to his own presents. 

Harry had to take a minute to try and calm the blush he could feel had risen on his cheeks before he could join them.

. . .

The eighth years opened their presents together in a circle, handing their presents to the designated recipients, building up their own pile as they went.

Neville opened his _mimbulus_ _mimbletonia_ , looking positively delighted with it; Blaise got his violin (and played it, much to the dismay of all present); Luna thanked the group for her flute, and then thanked Draco with the biggest smile when he gave her the newest copy of " _A Guide to Spotting Relatives of the Nargles_ ", while Harry opened his Quidditch set from Ron. Both the Golden Trio and the Silver Trio received knitted jumpers from Mrs. Weasley (Draco nearly cried) because, as Ron said, "C'mon guys, did you really think Mum was gonna let you out of sweaters now you're a part of our group? No way!"

(Draco in his Weasley jumper)

Hermione opened her present and got her quill and paperweight; she immediately set about writing something or other in the Never-Ending Notebook she'd received from Harry. 

Ron got the pensieve with the memory from Draco; most of the eighth-years present dived into the memory to watch Draco try over and over again to get the Slytherins to sing "Weasley is Our King" correctly, laughing when he ridiculed them (which was often) and full-on wheezing when, at one point, Draco gave up and stormed out of the room, returning a moment later to tell Millicent Bulstrode to "conjure up an airhorn, since it would be more likely to be in key than she was", and applauding the Slytherins when, at last, they managed to perform the song perfectly all the way through and Draco sunk on to one of the common-room sofas with a relieved sigh.

The eighth-years emerged from the memory still giggling; Ron said "Thanks, mate, that's bloody _brilliant_ ," and he and Draco became "official" friends.

The day had flown by; before he knew it, the sun was nearing the horizon, and only one present remained in front of Draco. It was from Harry.

He opened his present carefully, being careful not to rip anything, and found a- a skirt? No, _two_! One was skintight, with a slit up the right-hand side, in a gorgeous lush green; the second was softer, looser, a pretty pastel pink with a bow around the waistband and lace trimmings at the bottom and many poofy layers of tulle. He admired them both, glanced up to see Harry's eyes on him, cautious, hopeful; Draco grinned and ran out of the hall.

When he was sure he was out of sight, he changed into the pink skirt. It was lovely; so free and loose and swirly. He twirled again and again, watching how it flew out around him; when Pansy came looking for him, she applauded him, then walked him back into the Hall. All eyes were on him as he settled back down again, giving Harry an almost-shy grin and mouthing "Thank you," at him.

Harry himself had one present left in front of him; Draco's first present. Draco was waiting to give him the second present. Harry opened the present, pulling out the specially-made snowglobe; inside was a miniature sculpture of three buildings.

The Burrow stood tall and crooked, while Hogwarts stood large and proud. Harry's house from Goric Hollow was nestled between them, and when Harry shook the globe, a light snow dusted the roof.

Harry met Draco's eyes with a soft smile and mouthed, "Thank you," at him. Draco grinned. He wasn't done yet... But now wasn't the time. He decided to give Harry his second present at midnight; two hours from now. Most of the people gathered would still be awake, undoubtedly; Draco just hoped that Harry would be.

As he had expected, when the clock struck midnight, most of the group were still wide awake, supping hot chocolate and eating the last bits of pudding. Draco hesitantly made his way over to Harry and asked him to join him; Harry stood quickly and followed Draco out of the Hall. Draco lead him to the abandoned classroom a few twisted corridors down from the Great Hall, where Harry's second present had been residing for the last half hour or so.

"I have another present for you," Draco told him as he opened the door. Harry shot him a surprised glance and made his way into the classroom to open it. It sat on the nearest desk, wrapped carefully with air holes poked in the top. 

Harry started peeling off the wrapping paper, then jumped back into Draco's chest, nearly knocking him over. 

"Draco!" he hissed. "What have you _got_ in there? It _talks_!"

Oh, Draco had hoped this would happen. He grinned. "Open it, Harry," he said.

Harry proceeded more cautiously than before; when he realised what it was, he let out a soft _oh_. 

It was a snake.

An emerald tree boa, to be precise.

"She's not venomous," Draco murmured to Harry. Harry reached out and unlatched the cage, slowly lowering his arm inside, hissing softly. The snake flickered its tongue at him and made its way up his arm to coil around his forearm; she was a baby at the moment, but she could grow to be two meters long.

Harry turned to Draco smiling that special smile of his. "Thank you, Draco," he said. "Thank you so, so much."

The world allowed them a moment of silent peace, but when Harry opened his mouth to say something, a crack of apparition announced Jisky's arrival. "Master Draco," she said, "Your potion has finished."

Whatever Harry had been going to say was gone; he secured his snake around his arm and followed Draco out of the room, both of them running through the halls to reach the Room of Requirement. 

Draco threw open the door, rushed over to his potion; he completed the steps for the rest of the Sleeping Draught ever-so-slowly, making sure he was following all the instructions to the t. Harry watched him work with bated breath, hoping and hoping and hoping...

When the potion was finally done (the same colour as it was usually, thank Merlin) Draco took the smallest sample- only a drop- and put it on a small Mandrake test sample. It fell asleep quickly, which was a good sign, but Draco wouldn't be able to tell if the potion had worked entirely until the next morning. Harry summoned the snake's cage from the classroom and led Draco into his childhood home here in the Room; he and Draco both took separate bedrooms to wait out the night.

It appeared that while the day had passed faster than imaginable, the night was taking twice as long as usual. Draco tossed and turned for a good hour or two before finally dropping off into a fitful sleep.

He rose with the sun, praying that the mandrake had awoken, too; alas, when Draco returned to the potions area of the Room, he found the Mandrake still sleeping peacefully.

Draco was about to leave for the Great Hall in hopes that breakfast would pass the time, but realised that breakfast wouldn't have started this early in the morning. He looked around for something to do, but apparently the Room didn't provide things this early in the morning. Stupid Room. 

Draco's eyes caught on a stack of story books piled on a table next to Viv; the same books Harry had read to her before. Draco looked around, just to make sure no one was watching him, then pulled up a chair next to Viv and began reading to her in a hushed voice. 

He kept reading until he was interrupted by Harry. "Morning, Draco," he murmured.

"Morning, Harry. Mandrake's not up yet."

"Oh. What are you doing?"

That's what made Draco look up, almost guilty at having been caught reading children's books to a plant. "Um... Nothing," he said, hiding the book behind his back. Harry grinned at him in a sort of "You're hopeless," kind of way. Before he could say anything, Draco saw movement at the edge of his peripheral. His eyes shot to it; the mandrake, seeming to stretch in the sun. It was awake.

Draco stumbled over to it, nearly falling over his legs; they'd fallen asleep while he'd been reading to Viv. He examined the mandrake carefully, holding samples of the potion, uncorked, around it. It didn't move towards them at all. 

Draco met Harry's eyes, a grin spreading across his face.

He'd succeeded.


	24. Draco Malfoy and Harry Potter: Finally

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the last chapter of the fic! Thank you for reading, and I hope you've enjoyed it.

Draco spent quite some time continuing to test the potion; whether it was poisonous, or possibly toxic in any way at all, and if it still had the same effects when duplicated (it did, thank goodness. Draco wouldn't have to keep brewing more and more batches of it as long as he kept one vial of the original batch) before moving on to administering it to Harry and himself to check for effects from differently sized doses. It seemed to work just as well as the normal Draught- even better, if Draco did say so himself- and when their testing session was over, Draco and Harry were no more addicted to the potion than they had been when they began. 

Harry helped Draco bottle up the potion into the doses they thought would work best based on how they had reacted to smaller doses; approximately three drops for an hour of sleep seemed to be the rough measurement.

When the potion had all been bottled up, Harry levitated them into the Great Hall; with all eyes on him, Draco snuck in without anyone noticing and sat down at the Slytherin table. "That's them?" Pansy asked. Draco nodded. "Woah. Well done," she murmured to him.

"Mr. Potter, what have you brought us?" McGonagall asked.

Draco and Harry had gone over their plan, and if Harry messed it up, Draco would kill him.

Harry said, "Well, a person who has asked me not to reveal their identity sent me these last night. They're Dreamless Sleep potions, except not addictive."

McGonagall's eyes flickered to Draco. "And how, Mr. Potter, have they accomplished this?"

"Well, I can't tell you that, Professor, it's the secret to their success!"

McGonagall smiled and rolled her eyes. "Alright, alright. How do we know this person is trustworthy? How do we know these potions work?"

"They work. I used one last night, and I don't feel any addiction whatsoever, and I slept peacefully. You can trust the person." Harry met Draco's eyes. "I trust them with my life."

The _sap_. Draco blushed and looked down. 

"Alright then. Those who suffer from nightmares, come first to collect your sample."

The eighth years rose, the Hall silent for them in respect for what they'd done to bring about the nightmares. They all took a bottle from Harry with a quiet, "Thank you," before returning to their seats. When it was Draco's turn, he only pretended to take a bottle; he had many more stashed away in the Room of Requirement, and he didn't want to take someone else's potion. He and Harry shared a small, secret glance before Draco turned away and returned to his seat next to Pansy, who'd already taken her potion. 

"Thank you, Draco," she said. "Thank you."

The eighth years gathered in the Great Hall again that night, discussing who might've made the potions. Harry was being badgered with questions, and had been for most of the day; everyone wanted to know who'd succeeded where so many others had failed. Harry had kept the truth from the school for most of the day, but now he was being asked by his closest friends, and Draco could tell he was close to cracking. He decided to just keep an eye on Harry to make sure he didn't say anything, but otherwise continued his hushed conversation with Pansy.

"Guys, lay off Harry," Hermione told the group. 

"Why? Do _you_ know? I bet you do. Who is it?" someone asked.

"Er-" her gaze flickered to Draco. "Well, um, I can't say, they asked us to keep their identity a secret."

"Aw, c'mon. Hey, Harry, what about a trade? You tell me who gave you the potions and I'll give you my... Hm... Whatever you want!"

Harry gave them a calculating look, then smirked. "Okay. Deal. Come on."

Draco watched Harry lead the student- a Ravenclaw- out of the Great Hall, following quietly as the rest of the group continued to pester Hermione.

"Okay," Harry said, "I tell you who gave me the potions, and you'll give me anything I want?"

The student nodded.

"Well, Hedwig brought me the potions, all boxed up, last night."

The student gave Harry the most betrayed look. "But- you said-!"

Harry grinned. "Yup. Now, anything I want?"

The student paled.

"Oh, don't worry. I have everything I want already." Harry waved the student off, murmuring, "Or nearly," after they passed through the doors. Draco stepped out from behind the column where he'd been hiding. 

"What do you mean, 'nearly'? And also, Harry, you nearly gave me a heart attack. Please don't do that again, even if it _was_ entertaining to watch."

Harry grinned and grabbed Draco's hand. "I make no promises. Now, when we get back in there, I'm telling everyone that you know who made the potions so that you get harassed by them."

"You _wouldn't_!"

"I would."

Draco took a step away from Harry- or he was going to. His foot never left the floor, and he just fell over. "What- I can't-"

Hermione poked her head out the door. "Oh, good, you fell for it," she said.

"Wh- have you cursed me? Let me go this instant or I'll- I'll-"

"No use making empty threats, Draco," Pansy said, joining Hermione.

"Pansy! How _could_ you? You _wound_ me. Truly, I'm _betrayed_ -"

"Oh shush, Draco there's an easy enough way to get out," she interrupted.

Beside him, Harry groaned. "Really, 'Mione? _Really_?"

"Yup. I'd say I'm sorry, but I'm really not."

"What?" Draco asked. "What is it?"

Hermione and Pansy grinned and shut the door.

"Draco," Harry said softly, "Look up."

Above their heads was a sprig of mistletoe.

Oh, Merlin, Draco knew that mistletoe. It was the same mistletoe Pansy had enchanted, way back in third year, trying to get Draco to kiss someone. If you walked under it, it would hold you in place until you kissed someone. Draco had managed to avoid it... Up until now. But looking at Harry... Well, there were worse people to get stuck under magical mistletoe with. But that didn't mean Draco would give in to Pansy's antics, even if he maybe (sorta ( _really_ )) wanted to.

So he ignored the mistletoe, standing back up again, and said to Harry, "You'd better not set that mob on me when we get back in."

"Oh? So you're planning on getting out from under this mistletoe, then?"

"Shut up, Harry," Draco muttered blushing.

"Okay. And even if we do get out, how are you planning on getting me to shut up about who made the potions?" He smirked at Draco. "What'll you do? Kiss me?"

Oh, the little _brat_. He knew _exactly_ what he was doing.

So Draco did the only acceptable thing in that situation.

He glared at Harry, wrapped his arms around him, and kissed him. 


End file.
